Department of Biomedical Engineering, Washington University, St. Louis, Missouri 63130, USA.
Ann N Y Acad Sci. 2010 Feb;1188:103-10. doi: 10.1111/j.1749-6632.2009.05089.x.
During early development, the initially straight heart tube (HT) bends and twists (loops) into a curved tube to lay out the basic plan of the mature heart. The physical mechanisms that drive and regulate looping are not yet completely understood. This paper reviews our recent studies of the mechanics of cardiac torsion during the first phase of looping (c-looping). Experiments and computational modeling show that torsion is primarily caused by forces exerted on the HT by the primitive atria and the splanchnopleure, a membrane that presses against the ventral surface of the heart. Experimental and numerical results are described and integrated to propose a hypothesis for cardiac torsion, and key aspects of our hypothesis are tested using experiments that perturb normal looping. For each perturbation, the models predict the correct qualitative response. These studies provide new insight into the mechanisms that drive and regulate cardiac looping.
在早期发育过程中，最初笔直的心脏管（HT）弯曲并扭曲（环化）成弯曲的管，以制定成熟心脏的基本计划。驱动和调节环化的物理机制尚未完全了解。本文回顾了我们最近对第一阶段环化（c-环化）期间心脏扭转的力学的研究。实验和计算模型表明，扭转主要是由原始心房和胚肠，即压在心的腹侧表面的膜对 HT 施加的力引起的。描述了实验和数值结果，并将其整合在一起，提出了一个心脏扭转的假设，并用扰乱正常环化的实验来检验我们假设的关键方面。对于每个扰动，模型预测出正确的定性响应。这些研究为驱动和调节心脏环化的机制提供了新的见解。
