
Mesmerizing Video Shows Cardiac Cells Building a Heart
The images were captured using a technique called light-sheet microscopy (LSM). Essentially, LSM involves scanning a sample with a thin sheet of light, creating sharp, detailed, three-dimensional images of living tissue without damaging it.
Researchers from University College London (UCL) and the Francis Crick Institute in the UK used the method to track how mouse embryo cells begin to specialize into roles, divide, and arrange themselves into the structure of a heart.
The team tagged the different types of cells with fluorescent markers, then captured images of them every two minutes for up to 41 hours. The resulting timelapse shows a ragtag group of nondescript cells coming together to form a living, beating mouse heart in a way that's truly captivating to watch.
It's not just beautiful; it helped the team uncover new details about cardiac development. Surprisingly, individual cells seemed to already 'know' where they need to go and which roles they'll end up playing, even as early as four or five hours after the first embryonic cell divided.
"Our findings demonstrate that cardiac fate determination and directional cell movement may be regulated much earlier in the embryo than current models suggest," says Kenzo Ivanovitch, developmental biologist at UCL.
"This fundamentally changes our understanding of cardiac development by showing that what appears to be chaotic cell migration is actually governed by hidden patterns that ensure proper heart formation."
While it's a long way off from any practical benefits, a better understanding of this process could potentially lead to new treatment options for congenital heart defects, the team says.
The research was published in The EMBO Journal.
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Medscape
6 hours ago
- Medscape
Younger, Smaller Children Show Less Success With ART
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'We think it's likely that in trials, where participants have increased support, adolescents have good responses to treatment, and it is the youngest children who are at highest risk of treatment failure,' he noted. Reasons for greater treatment failure in younger children may include the need for different formulations, as well as the reliance on caregivers to administer the drugs, which can be difficult, he added. Both CD4% and BMI-for-age are previously recognized predictors of treatment failure. Takeaways and Next Steps The study's findings support previous research showing young age as a strong risk factor for treatment failure with ART, Wyncoll told Medscape Medical News. 'Even with early diagnosis and ART, other studies like the EARTH cohort and the LIFE trial show high mortality in the first 2 years of life, especially within the first 6 months,' he said. 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Associated Press
5 days ago
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Yahoo
6 days ago
- Yahoo
Britons smoke an estimated 28.6 billion cigarettes every year, study finds
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