Gene editing to prevent ventricular arrhythmias associated with cardiomyocyte cell therapy

Newswise — Engraftment arrhythmia (EA) compromises the safety of hPSC-CM cell therapy. We hypothesized that spontaneous graft depolarizations are the source of EAs. We used a CRISPR screen to demonstrate that targeting excitatory channels HCN4, CACNA1H, and SLC8A1 and expressing the inhibitory KCNJ2 channel generates quiescent-yet-excitable cardiomyocytes that engraft without resulting in EAs.