If these myocytes could talk, they would speak the language of metabolites

Cardiac wound healing following ischemic injury requires a well-described spatiotemporal progression of events involving multiple cell types and cell-cell interactions. While cellular crosstalk among immune cell, endothelial cell, and fibroblast populations is known to regulate these progressive phases, the role of cardiac myocytes in controlling the wound-healing program is unclear. In this issue of the JCI, Li et al. describe a mechanism of cellular crosstalk between cardiac myocytes and fibroblasts that disrupts nonmyocyte cell function and worsens wound healing outcomes following myocardial infarction (MI). This tour de force study used an arsenal of multidisciplinary approaches to identify a central role for the ectonucleotidase ENPP1 in this process. These findings have clear therapeutic implications, as the authors identified a small molecular inhibitor of ENPP1 that improved post-MI outcomes in mice. These exciting data provide impactful mechanistic information that advance the field’s understanding of cardiac repair and remodeling.