Fishing for Clues
The four chambers of our hearts – two atria above two ventricles – started working long before birth, yet how they first form is still a little mysterious. Fortunately, one of our distant ancestors – the zebrafish – may have clues. Here, a high-powered microscope pictures a developing zebrafish heart from different angles. Cells highlighted in blue have a gene called meis2b switched on – in adult fish this one-sided, asymmetric, pattern helps to distinguish the left and right sides of the fish’s single atrium. The human form of meis2b may help to separate our left and right atria chambers during development – a genetic instruction passed down from the fish’s simpler heart. Faults in such genes can lead to congenital heart defects, and zebrafish may soon be called upon again to investigate the causes, and potential treatments, for these human conditions.
Written by John Ankers
- Image by Almary Guerra
- Department of Developmental Genetics, Max Planck Institute for Heart and Lung Research, Bad Nauheim, Germany
- Image copyright held by the original authors
- Research published in eLife, May 2018
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