2012 Small World In Motion Competition

Calendar

Honorable Mention

Imaging of the formation of the anterior hindbrain from a flat sheet of neural plate cells in a zebrafish embryo

Fengzhu Xiong

Affiliation: Harvard Medical School
Megason Lab
Department of Systems Biology
Boston, Massachusetts, USA

Technique: Confocal Time-lapse

Magnification: 400x

The video demonstrates the formation of the anterior hindbrain from a flat sheet of neural plate cells in a zebrafish embryo. In particular, we view the patterns of the nervous system, which are important for understanding human disease. Membrane and nuclear fluorescent proteins were used to label the cells.

Honorable Mention

2012 Small World In Motion Competition

Beating heart of a living 2 day old Danio rerio (zebrafish)

Dr. Michael Weber

Affiliation: Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics
Dresden, Saxony, Germany

Technique: Selective Plane Illumination Microscopy (SPIM)

Magnification: 20x

The heart muscle cells of this transgenic fish expresses GCaMP, a genetically encoded fluorescent calcium indicator. Visible is the wave of cardiac conduction, traveling over the heart from atrium (bottom) to ventricle (top left). The heart has a size of about 250 um and beats at a rate of about two times per second. It was imaged in 3D inside the living zebrafish using Selective Plane Illumination Microscopy (SPIM) (Huisken et al. 2004).