Characterization of Ventricular and Atrial Cardiomyocyte Subtypes from Human-Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells

Human iPSC-derived cardiomyocytes (hiPSC-CMs) are expected to be used in regenerative therapies and drug discovery for heart failure. hiPSC-CMs are a mixture of mainly ventricular CMs (VCMs) and also of atrial CMs (ACMs) and pacemaker cells. Here we describe a method to enrich VCM and ACM differentiation and to characterize these subtypes by gene expression analysis using qRT-PCR and by electrophysiological properties using the patch-clamp method. The differentiated VCMs and ACMs highly express VCM and ACM marker genes, respectively. Furthermore, both subtypes show specific properties of action potentials.