Differentiation and Contractile Analysis of GFP-Sarcomere Reporter hiPSC-Cardiomyocytes

Human induced pluripotent stem cell-derived cardiomyocytes (hiPSC-CMs) represent a powerful cellular platform for illuminating mechanisms of human cardiovascular disease and for pharmacological screening. Recent advances in CRISPR/Cas9-mediated genome editing technology underlie this profound utility. We have generated hiPSC-CMs harboring fluorescently-tagged sarcomeric proteins, which provide a tool to non-invasively study human sarcomere function and dysfunction. In this unit, we illustrate methods for conducting high-efficiency, small molecule-mediated differentiation of hiPSCs into cardiomyocytes, and for performing non-invasive contractile analysis through direct sarcomere tracking of GFP-sarcomere reporter hiPSC-CMs. We believe that this type of analysis can overcome sensitivity problems found in other forms of contractile assays involving hiPSC-CMs by directly measuring contractility at the fundamental contractile unit of the hiPSC-CM, the sarcomere. © 2018 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.