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Review
. 2025 Sep 10;52(1):880.
doi: 10.1007/s11033-025-11001-4.

Heart-derived endogenous stem cells

Keiko Inouye  1 , Garrison White  1 , Sadia Khan  1 , Joseph Luba  1 , Peyman Benharash  2 , Finosh G Thankam  3
Affiliations
Review

Heart-derived endogenous stem cells

Keiko Inouye et al. Mol Biol Rep. .

Abstract

Regenerative cardiology has emerged as a novel strategy to improve cardiac healing following ischemic injury. While stem-cell-mediated cardiac regeneration has garnered much attention as a promising strategy, its value remains debated owing to the lack of ideal stem cell source candidates. Resident/endogenous cardiac-derived stromal cells (CSCs) exhibit superior therapeutic potential due to their innate abilities to differentiate into cardiac cells, especially cardiomyocytes (CM). Emerging research has highlighted diverse endogenous CSCs phenotypes and sub-types as candidates for cardiac repair. Interestingly, CSCs promote healing through angiogenesis and regenerative paracrine signaling along with replenishing CM, and CM-like cells in the ischemic heart. Unfortunately, the clonogenic properties and translational potential of CSCs are minimally explored. This review examines the healing promise of a myriad CSCs such as c-kit + cardiac cells, Sca-1 + cells, cardiosphere-derived cells, side population cells, Bm1 + cells, cardiac atrial appendage cells, cardiac adipose cells, epicardial cells, and Isl1 + cells. Also, the review highlights the areas of improvement regarding the therapeutic applications of CSC to extrapolate into the clinical arena of cardiac management.

Keywords: Cardiac regeneration; Cardiac-derived stromal cells; Myocardial infarction; Resident stem cells.

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Conflict of interest statement

Declarations. Conflict of interest: All the authors have read the manuscript and declare no conflict of interest. No writing assistance or AI tools were utilized in the preparation of this manuscript. Ethical approval: Not applicable. Consent to publish: All authors have approved the final version of the manuscript and read the journal’s authorship agreement and policy on disclosure of potential conflicts of interest. The authors declared no conflict of interest.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Methods of stem cell-mediated transplantation for cardiac healing
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
Overview of resident CSCs, surface receptors, and locations in the heart
Fig. 3
Fig. 3
Signaling pathways involved in regenerative functions of CSCs
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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