Engineering of a model of human ventricular tissue taking into account morphology

Cardiomyocytes obtained by differentiation from human pluripotent stem cells serve as an indispensable platform for the fundamental study of the mechanisms of cardiovascular diseases. While the possibility of reproducing rare pathologies, individual selection of drugs and other issues related to the electrophysiological properties of single cardiomyocytes have been well studied, little attention has been paid to the properties of the syncytium of differentiated cells. Thus, one of the important properties was the reproduction of homogeneous conductive syncytium when transplanted to a new substrate, which is strictly dependent on the stage of cell differentiation: once on a new substrate, single cells are able to form conductive tissue, but lose this property after 20 days of differentiation. The aim of this work is a theoretical explanation of this dependence based on the morphology of differentiated cells. To simulate the process of tissue formation, the Potts cell model was used, based on immunocytochemical images of single cardiomyocytes at different stages of differentiation. The conduction of the excitation wave through such virtual cardiac layers was reproduced using the ten-Tusscher Panfilov electrophysiological model. According to the results of the work, it was possible to establish a connection between the morphology of single cells and the properties of the tissue formed from them, which allows us to explain the relationship of the differentiation stage with the properties of the tissue transplanted to a new substrate.