Experimental study on the therapy of acute myocardial infarction with the transplantation of skeletal myoblasts transfected with vascular endothelial growth factor gene regulated by hypoxic response elements

Objective To investigate the therapy of acute myocardial infarction with the transplantation of skeletal myoblasts transfected with pcDNA3.1/vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) vector and pEGFP-C3-9HRE-CMV-VEGF vector.Methods The rat models of acute myocardial infarction were established.Serum-free medium (group A),control skeletal myoblasts (group B),skeletal myoblasts transfected withpcDNA3.1/VEGF vector (group C) and skeletal myoblasts transfected with pEGFP-C3-9HRE-CMV-VEGF vector (group D) were injected into the border zone surrounding the infarct respectively.The mortality,cardiac function,infarct size,grafted myoblasts,expression of VEGF and angiogenesis were observed 4 weeks later to demonstrate the therapy of acute myocardial infarction with transfected skeletal myoblasts.Results The mortality rates were better in groups C (10.0)％ and D (13.3)％ than in groups B (26.7) ％.The cardiac function were better in groups C (32.9 ± 1.4) ％ and D (33.1 ± 1.4) ％than in groups A(44.5 ± 1.7) ％ and B (38.2 ± 1.5) ％.The expression of VEGF and angiogenesis were increased in groups C and D than in groups A and B.Conclusion This combined strategy of skeletal myoblasts transplantation with gene therapy could be of importance for the treatment of acute myocardial infarction. Key words: Hypoxic response elements;  Vascular endothelial growth factor;  Gene therapy; Cell transplantation;  Acute myocardial infarction