Mechanically and Chemically Defined PEG Hydrogels Improve Reproducibility in Human Cardioid Development

The growth and culture of cardioids is either conducted in suspension culture or heavily relies on Matrigel encapsulation. Despite the significant advancements in cardioid technology, reproducibility remains a major challenge, limiting their widespread use in both basic research and translational applications.

Here, for the first time, we employed synthetic, matrix metalloproteinase (MMP)-degradable polyethylene glycol (PEG)-based hydrogels to define the effect of mechanical and biochemical cues on cardioid development. We demonstrated successful cardiac differentiation in all the hydrogel conditions, while cardioid cultured in optimized PEG hydrogel (3wt% PEG-2mM RGD) underwent similar morphological development and comparable tissue functions to those cultured in Matrigel.