Molecular determinants of cardiac specification

In this review, we report and analyse the molecular factors involved in cardiogenesis from the earliest stages of development, using mainly the chick embryo as a model. The first part of the review demonstrates the areas where cardiogenic cells are located from gastrula stages, analysing a brief summary of the fate map of cardiogenic cells, from the epiblast through to the primitive heart tube. The next part analyses the commitment of pre-cardiac cells in cardiogenesis before, during, and after ingression through the primitive streak. Throughout the different journeys of the pre-cardiac cells, from the origin on the epiblast level up to the constitution of the tubular heart in the mid-line, the genes involved in the different stages of the process of cardiogenesis are very numerous. These have a greater or lesser importance depending on their specificity and the order in which they appear, bearing in mind that they become more valuable as the developmental process advances and the precursor cells start acquiring the commitment of pre-cardiac cells. Next, we show some box-filled diagrams to illustrate the dynamic gene expression pattern through-out the early stages of heart development, grouping the genes by their chronological significance. Finally, we discuss the implications that this temporal genomic expression could have in the induction and specification of the different types of cells and regions of the heart.