Platelet-Targeted Delivery of Peripheral Blood Mononuclear Cells to the Ischemic Heart Restores Cardiac Function after Ischemia-Reperfusion Injury

One of the major hurdles in intravenous regenerative cell therapy is the low homing efficiency to the area where these cells are needed. To increase cell homing toward areas of myocardial damage, we developed a bispecific tandem single-chain antibody (Tand-scFvSca-1+GPIIb/IIIa) that binds with high affinity to activated platelets via the activated glycoprotein (GP)IIb/IIIa receptor, and to a subset of peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) which express the stem cell antigen-1 (Sca-1) receptor.