iPS Cells and Cardiomyopathies

The advent of induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSC) revolutionized the approach of studying cardiac diseases and development. The iPSC technology allows the generation of human cardiac platforms in vitro that can be used for modeling a disease of interest, for testing and discovering novel therapeutics. Furthermore, the possibility of generating genetically matched human cardiac progenitor cells and cardiomyocytes (CMs) have much potential in regenerative medicine. This chapter provides an overview of the cardiac models that have been developed thus far using iPSC and will entail: first, their advantages over other existing models; second, the impact of this technology for the understanding of pathogenesis of cardiac diseases with a particular focus on cardiomyopathies; and third, the importance of development of genome-editing strategies for the causal definition of mechanisms of diseases. In addition, how this gain of knowledge correlates with the development of novel therapeutic options for disease treatment and possible cure will also be discussed.