PASADENA, Calif., Dec 2, 2008 (UPI via COMTEX) -- U.S. scientists say they've
created, for the first time, images of the heart's muscular layer and the link
between it and the way the heart contracts.
California Institute of Technology researchers say their findings could help
create a road map for future cardiac surgical techniques.
The researchers showed the muscular band that wraps around the inner chambers of
the heart in a helix is actually a sort of "twisting highway" along which each
contraction of the heart travels.
"The heart twists to push blood out the same way you twist a wet towel to wring
water out of it," said Professor Morteza Gharib, who led the study.
Using a new imaging technique pioneered by Han Wen and colleagues at the
National Institutes of Health, Gharib and Abbas Nasiraei Moghaddam created some
of the first dynamic images of normal myocardium -- the middle muscular layer of
the heart wall -- in action at the tissue level.
"We tagged and traced small tissue elements in the heart, and looked at them in
space, so we could see how they moved when the heart contracts," Gharib said.
"In this way, we were able to see where the maximum physical contraction occurs
in the heart and when, and to show that it follows this intriguing helical
loop."
The research appeared in the December issue of Heart and Circulatory Physiology.
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Copyright 2008 by United Press International