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NIH issues grant for study of biological pacemakers
Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute researchers have received a $3 million grant from the NIH to develop a biological pacemaker that can treat patients with bradycardia.
According to a press release issued by the institute, the researchers are exploring a novel, minimally invasive gene therapy that turns a patient’s heart cells into pacemaker cells, potentially regulating heart function.
“Devices can malfunction or become infected, while biological pacemakers avoid such complications,” Eugenio Cingolani, MD, director of Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute’s cardiogenetics program and principal investigator of the project, said in the release.
The gene, Tbx18, would be delivered directly into the heart through a catheter-based procedure, according to the release.
“In 2012, our team was the first to show that we can inject a single gene, called Tbx18, into a regular heart cell and turn that cell into a specialized pacemaker cell,” Eduardo Marbán, MD, PhD, director of the Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute and co-principal investigator of the project, said in the release. “This new funding will help us complete long-term safety and efficacy data using clinical-grade gene delivery systems, hopefully leading to a clinical trial in which we can test the therapy in selected patients.”
If the safety studies are successful, the biological pacemaker could be tested in people within the next 5 years, according to the release.