The Embryonic Vertebrate Heart Tube Is a Dynamic Suction Pump
Abstract
The embryonic vertebrate heart begins pumping blood long before the development of discernable chambers and valves. At these early stages, the heart tube has been described as a peristaltic pump. Recent advances in confocal laser scanning microscopy and four-dimensional visualization have warranted another look at early cardiac structure and function. We examined the movement of cells in the embryonic zebrafish heart tube and the flow of blood through the heart and obtained results that contradict peristalsis as a pumping mechanism in the embryonic heart. We propose a more likely explanation of early cardiac dynamics in which the pumping action results from suction due to elastic wave propagation in the heart tube.
Additional Information
© 2006 American Association for the Advancement of Science. Received 13 December 2005; accepted 6 April 2006. We thank J. Dabiri, M. Milano, J. Vermot, and J. Pierce for comments on the paper; S. Megason and L. Trinh for help with zebrafish and imaging techniques; and S. Lin for providing the Tg(gata1:GFP) zebrafish line. This work was supported by American Heart Association grant 03665071Y (J.R.H.), NIH grant 5R01HL078694 (S.E.F., M.E.D., and M.L.), and Swiss National Science Foundation grants PBEL2-104418 and PA002-111433 (M.L.).Attached Files
Supplemental Material - 1123775sMovie1.mov
Supplemental Material - 1123775sMovie2.mov
Supplemental Material - 1123775sMovie3.mov
Supplemental Material - 1123775sMovie4.mov
Supplemental Material - Forouhar.SOM.pdf
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Additional details
- Eprint ID
- 41227
- DOI
- 10.1126/science.1123775
- Resolver ID
- CaltechAUTHORS:20130911-075435084
- American Heart Association
- 03665071Y
- NIH
- 5R01HL078694
- Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF)
- PBEL2-104418
- Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF)
- PA002-111433
- Created
-
2013-09-11Created from EPrint's datestamp field
- Updated
-
2023-03-14Created from EPrint's last_modified field
- Caltech groups
- GALCIT