Major research funding for an overlooked tissue constiuent in the heart
The German Research Foundation (DFG) is supporting a new Freiburg-based Research Unit investigating the role of the interstitium as a determinant of cardiac function.
From 2026, the DFG will provide €5.7 million in funding over four years to the new Research Unit ‘FOR6051: The Interstitium – A Key Determiant of Cardiac Function’. FOR6051 will investigate how ‘the tissue in-between’ the main working cells of the heart influences the cardiac electrical and mechanical function. The findings will help develop new approaches to maintaining heart function, for example after myocardial infarction.
“The tissue between the heart’s muscle cells is far more important for cardiac function than previously assumed. We want to understand not only how it connects heart muscle cells, blood vessels and the cardiac nervous system, but how it acts as a reaction vessel and signalling environment. This could lead to a new mechanistic understanding of cardiac structure and function,” says Prof. Dr Peter Kohl, spokesperson for FOR6051 and Director of the Institute for Experimental Cardiovascular Medicine at the University Medical Centre Freiburg.
The interstitial tissue has been ill-investigated to date
Heart research usually focuses on cardiac muscle cells that generate the heartbeat, the vasculature that enables their metabolic activity, and the cardiac nervous system that steers heart function. However, the tissue between these cells – including connective tissue and tissue fluid – is also crucial to heart function. This so-called interstitium provides stability to the heart, connects various structures, and acts as an important signalling hub for biophysical and biochemical cues. To data, little is currently known about its exact role and regulation; the Freiburg Research Unit aims to change that.
FOR6051 brings together 16 researchers from the University of Freiburg and the University Medical Centre Freiburg, as well as academic partners from Berlin, Karlsruhe, Göttingen, Würzburg and the Saarland.
Open positions will be available soon!