Isolation and culture of adult rat cardiomyocytes

    WANG Tingª²Zhong, XI Yuª²Tao, WU Geª²Ru, MA Aiª²Qun

    Department of Cardiovascular Medicine, Key Laboratory of Environment and Genes Related to Diseases, Ministry of Education, First Hospital, Xi¬ðan Jiaotong University, Xi¬ðan 710061 China

    ¡¾Abstract¡¿ AIM: To establish a method of isolation and culture of adult rat cardiomyocytes. METHODS: Adult rat cardiomyocytes were isolated by aorta retrograde collagenase perfusion and identified with immunofluorence of ¦Áª²actin, desmin and cTnT. The effects of culture with or without serum on adult rat cardiomyocytes were compared. RESULTS: Homogeneous populations of 95% rodª²shaped cells were obtained routinely and the cells were complete in shape and the ratio between the length and width was 4 or 6 to 1. Adult rat cardiomyocytes were alive in serumª²free culture for only less than 1 weeks and no shape changes were observed. Myocytes in culture with serum were alive for more than 2 weeks but some ultrastructural changes were observed. Serum of different concentrations were found to have different effects on cultured cardiomyocytes. CONCLUSION: Aorta retrograde collagenase perfusion is an ideal method to isolate cardiomyocytes. Serum has some important effect on adult rat cardiomyocytes culture. ......