Year 2

The goal of this project is to identify small molecules that stimulate cardiomyocyte differentiation from stem cells. The strategy is to use embryonic stem ESC)-derived progenitors to screen for compounds and then optimize their chemical properties to generate molecules that can be used as reagents and potentially as lead compounds to develop drugs to stimulate regeneration in patient hearts. During year 2, progress is reported in: 1) optimizing the biological and pharmaceutical properties of 4 chemically diverse compounds discovered in year 1; 2) patent application filed on these compounds; 3) identification of targets and biological mechanism of action of 2 of the 4 compounds; 4) 1 compound has been validated in hESCs; 5) pilot screening completed of a new stem cell screen to discover molecules that act on late stage progenitors similar to cells thought to exist in the adult heart; 5) new assays developed and screened for discovering modulators of the Wnt pathway that enhance cardiomyocyte production. Thus, there are a total of 8 chemically distinct compounds under study and additional assays have been developed that should bring additional compounds into the pipeline during year 3.