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Bony fish like the tiny zebrafish have a remarkable ability that mammals can only dream of: If you lop off a chunk of their heart they swim sluggishly for a few days but within a month appear perfectly normal. In a paper published in Nature magaznie, researchers identified a fish heart cell that's the source of this feat, a finding that could provide insight into how mammalian hearts might be coaxed into repairing themselves after injury brought on by heart attack. Repair is accomplished by cardiac muscle cells known as cardiomyocytes, whose normal job is to supply the contractile force of the heart. Here, heart muscle cells (shown in green), regress to a more youthful state after injury, start dividing again (indicated by a red marker) to replenish lost cells and then mature a second time into cardiomyocytes. Source: Dr. Juan Carlos Izpisúa Belmonte, Salk Institute for Biological Studies Via: FoxNews.com's EyePoppers

By: ScienceIllustrated Copyright © All Rights Reserved

Taken: May 5, 2010
Uploaded: May 5, 2010

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