Incredible New 3D Imaging Technique Provides New Way to Study Beating Hearts (VIDEO). While we know quite a bit about the heart’s dynamics, there are a lot of details that we surely are still unaware of that can be gleaned only if we could see inside the beating organ in situ. A team of researchers at Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics in Dresden, Germany has developed a new laboratory technique that allows them to image in 3D and at high resolution the full dynamics of a zebrafish heart. They combined the imaging technique with optogenetics, a way of embedding genes that allow light to be used to turn certain processes on and off, to stop and start the zebrafish heart at will. This allowed the team to study the heart when it’s beating normally and when it is experiencing arrhythmias. The imaging relies on high-speed Selective Plane Illumination Microscopy (SPIM), which breaks up the field into sections and view them at different angles. A computer then reassembles the data into 3D movies that can be viewed from any perspective. Here’s a beautiful example of this imaging done on a zebrafish heart:. Read More » . July 24, 2014 at 03:25PM from Medgadget ift.tt/qqrTwx
Posted on: Thu, 24 Jul 2014 15:27:48 +0000
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