High-Throughput Investigation of EC Coupling in Isolated Cardiac Myocytes

During this webinar, Michiel Helmes, PhD, discusses recent advancements in instrumentation that address the shortfalls of low-throughput EC coupling characterization. Specifically, Dr. Helmes explains the technology behind faster data acquisition and analysis as well as improvements to the studies that offer more data acquisition fidelity and automated data collection. He offers insights into best practices for proper EC coupling measurement and highlight improvements to data handling, namely faster, automated data analysis.

Background: Measuring and analyzing calcium and contractility in isolated cardiomyocytes offers important insights into cardiac function. However, traditional methods of obtaining EC coupling data are somewhat limited to lower throughput; for many applications, particularly drug discovery research, this presents a big challenge. Additionally, low-throughput data acquisition and analysis may lack the statistical power necessary to fully resolve differences, or changes, in cardiac function. Isolated myocytes can behave heterogeneously, thus greater sample numbers are essential for accurate and reliable modeling of cardiac behavior.