Bioengineered muscle constructs and tissue-based therapy for cardiac disease

Bioengineering of contractile muscle tissues and organs for disease treatment is currently in the preclinical experimental stage of development. Cell biology over the last several decades has primarily focused on breaking down tissues and cells to smaller and smaller components to understand their functioning at the molecular level. We are just beginning to understand how to reassemble these components back into larger functional units. The merging of the fields of traditional engineering, biomaterials, cell biology, and computer science will lead to the ex vivo engineering tissues and organs for many cardiovascular applications in the future. For pediatric cardiology, bioengineered contractile tissues may serve as force generating cardiac patches, heart valve papillary muscle substitutes, or as living therapeutic protein delivery 'devices' when bioengineered from genetically engineered muscle cells.