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23 September 2016

Heart Parts

Hearts are built to last – beating millions of times over a lifetime – but their early stages are still a mystery. In this developing heart, from a zebrafish, muscle cells (cardiomyocytes) have squashed together like building blocks to form the smooth ventricle (red). Yet sometime between one and two weeks into development, cardiomyocytes in the atrium take a drastically different path – stretching out into a web of long thin, spindles. Brainbow technology ‘paints’ each cell in the webbed atrium a different colour, now they can be tracked through development. So, what does it mean that the ventricle and atrium develop in different ways? Well, examining the genes responsible might suggest new targets to tackle congenital defects in human hearts, or even guide the timing of in-utero surgical procedures to save newly beating hearts.

Written by John Ankers

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BPoD stands for Biomedical Picture of the Day. Managed by the MRC Laboratory of Medical Sciences until Jul 2023, it is now run independently by a dedicated team of scientists and writers. The website aims to engage everyone, young and old, in the wonders of biology, and its influence on medicine. The ever-growing archive of more than 4000 research images documents over a decade of progress. Explore the collection and see what you discover. Images are kindly provided for inclusion on this website through the generosity of scientists across the globe.

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