A Swimmer’s Body
This glacial blue, gold, and red tapestry is a cross section through the junction between the head and the abdomen of a zebrafish. Here we can see the muscles, veins, and surrounding tissue within the abdomen, helping scientists study the relationship between the muscles and circulatory system.
Media For Educational Use Only
DownloadA Swimmer’s Body
This glacial blue, gold, and red tapestry is a cross section through the junction between the head and the abdomen of a zebrafish. Here we can see the muscles, veins, and surrounding tissue within the abdomen, helping scientists study the relationship between the muscles and circulatory system.
What am I looking at?
This is a section through the dorsal region (back) of the junction between the head and the abdomen of a zebrafish. The nuclei of the cells in the tissue sample are in red (1). The muscle tissue is blue (2). The veins running through the tissue sample are gold (3).
Biology in the Background
Fish have muscles and veins that function more or less the same as ours. These muscles allow fish to move and help protect internal organs. The veins running through the muscles provide oxygen and other nutrients to the muscle cells. This image displays the structure, organization, and relationship between the muscle tissue and the vasculature (veins) in this section of the abdomen.
Gaining a better understanding of this relationship in fish could build the foundation for additional research regarding the relationship between our muscles and circulatory system and therefore how we might treat muscle and circulatory disorders in the future.
The section of muscle you see in this image is about 900 micrometers across, or roughly 12 times larger than the width of a human hair.
Technique
This image was created using confocal microscopy.
Julien Resseguier, University of Oslo