LAUSR

This editorial refers to ‘Exosomes secreted by cardiosphere-derived cells reduce scarring, attenuate adverse remodelling, and improve function in acute and chronic porcine myocardial infarction’, by R. Gallet et al ., doi:10.1093/eurheartj/ehw240 … The difference between past, present and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusionAlbert Einstein Repair of the damaged cardiac tissue has been considered the holy grail of cardiac medicine driving researchers for years. Myocardial damage in an adult heart leads to widespread cardiomyocyte loss without active replacement of the dead cardiac tissue, ultimately resulting in formation of scar at the site of injury. Current therapies are designed only to limit the extent of scar formation and are unable to offer restoration of lost cardiac tissue, leading to a progressive decline in cardiac function. As a consequence, cardiac diseases continue to rise and are a significant cause of morbidity and mortality around the world. The last 10 years have witnessed the dawn of stem cell therapy for cardiac repair with promising true cellular replacement and restoration of cardiac tissue damaged due to pathological injury. Multiple stem cell types derived from bone marrow, heart, adipose tissue, and cortical bone have been tested in small and large animal models of myocardial damage. Among these, stem cells derived from the heart hold particular interest and represent the most suitable cell type for cardiac repair.1 Different populations of cardiac stem cells have been reported to date and, importantly, all of them have been shown to differentiate into three cardiac cell types, i.e. myocytes, endothelial cells, and smooth muscle cells, contribute towards neovascularization, and significantly improve function after myocardial damage.1,2 Promising pre-clinical results have laid …