Improving the development of human engineered cardiac tissue by gold nanorods embedded extracellular matrix for long-term viability

A myocardial infarction (MI), commonly called a heart attack, results in the death of cardiomyocytes (CMs) in the heart. Tissue engineering provides a promising strategy for the treatment of MI, but the maturation of human engineered cardiac tissue (hECT) still requires improvement. Conductive polymers and nanomaterials have been incorporated into the extracellular matrix to enhance the mechanical and electrical coupling between cardiac cells. Here we report a simple approach to incorporate gold nanorods (GNRs) into the fibrin hydrogel to form a GNR-fibrin matrix, which is used as the major component of the extracellular matrix for forming a 3D hECT construct suspended between two flexible posts. The hECTs made with GNR-fibrin hydrogel showed markers of maturation such as higher twitch force, synchronous beating activity, sarcomere maturation and alignment, t-tubule network development, and calcium handling improvement. Most importantly, the GNR-hECTs can survive over 9 months. We envision that the hECT with GNRs holds the potential to restore the functionality of the infarcted heart. Gold nanorod embedded extracellular matrix significantly enhanced the maturation and lifetime of human engineered cardiac tissue.