VALA SCIENCES, INC. — Department of Health and Human Services SBIR Phase II: NIEHS

Description

DESCRIPTION provided by applicant Defects in heart formation during embryonic and fetal development likely contribute to miscarriages which terminate up to of all pregnancies and Congential Heart Defects CHDs which are among the most common birth defects Environmental factors may influence miscarriages and up to of all CHDs but little is known about how such chemicals affect formation of the heart during early embryonic differentiation The goal of this SBIR project is to develop a Cardiopoiesis Assay heart formation assay to enable testing of compounds to determine if they influence the emergence of cardiac myocytes from multipotent mesodermal progenitors a critical early decision point in heart formation During the previous Phase I portion of the project a version of the assay was developed using mouse embryonic stem cells and this assay has proven useful in identifying chemicals siRNAs and miRs that modify cardiac differentiation For Phase II we propose to develop the assay using human induced pluripotent stem cells hiPSCs which will be derived from multiple donors to increase the genetic diversity represented by the assay The Cardiopoiesis Assay will be useful in predicting whether chemical compounds affect heart formation in the human embryo which is of critical importance to human health The assay will be of interest to government agencies in the US such as the Environmental Protection Agency and worldwide concerned with environmental toxicology PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE Defects of the heart are the most common birth defects and may be caused in part by toxic compounds from the environment that interfere with heart formation prior to birth We propose to develop a test system to screen chemicals for dangerous effects on heart formation We propose to use human stem cells which we will derive from skin samples obtained from volunteer donors the skin samples are obtained by a painless procedure that is risk free Such stem cells can be cultured in a manner that they form beating heart cells in laboratory dishes We will develop a procedure to test if chemicals prevent formation of heart cells from stem cells as such chemicals are likely to cause heart birth defects