how to mend a broken heart

A Lesson From the Zebrafish How to Mend a Broken Heart

An ability to regrow damaged or missing heart tissue makes the lowly zebrafish an ideal model for discovering new ways to repair human hearts, scientists say.

When a part of its heart is removed, the tiny zebrafish is a bit sluggish for a few days, but then appears normal within a month. This remarkable heart repair is achieved by differentiated cardiac muscle cells called cardiomyocytes -- not stem cells, but mature cells that normally supply the contractile force of the heart.

"What the results of our study show is that Mother Nature utilizes other ways besides going all the way back to pluripotent stem cells to regenerate tissues and organs," Juan Carlos Izpisua Belmonte, a professor in the Gene Expression Laboratory at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in California, said in a news release.

The study appears in the March 25 issue of the journal Nature.

Prior to heart failure, damaged mammal heart muscle cells enter a state called hibernation, in which they stop contracting in an effort to survive. Mammal heart cell hibernation is significant, said study first author Chris Jopling, a postdoctoral fellow at the Center of Regenerative Medicine in Barcelona, Spain.

"During heart regeneration in the zebrafish we found that cardiomyocytes displayed structural changes similar to those observed in hibernating cardiomyocytes," Jopling said in the news release. "Because of these similarities, we hypothesize that hibernating mammalian cardiomyocytes may represent cells that are attempting to proliferate."

"This idea fits nicely with the findings from a number of groups -- that forced expression of cell cycle regulators can induce cardiomyocyte proliferation in mammals. Maybe all they need is a bit of push in the right direction," Jopling said.

Researchers are looking for factors that supply that push.

Source:- businessweek.com

Man Who Survived Two Atomic Bombs

Image Credit

Tsutomu Yamaguchi was, depending on your point of view either the luckiest man on Planet Earth of exactly the opposite. Either way, what happened to him in the August of 1945 is nothing short of amazing – and his survival miraculous.

Yamaguchi was a resident of Nagasaki but on the fateful day of 6 August 1945 he was in Hiroshima, on business for his employer, Mitsubishi. He was badly wounded when the bomb carried by Enola Gay exploded above Hiroshima but survived and returned to Nagasaki the next day.

Amazingly, he returned to work on August 9 – most of us in this day and age will take a day off work if we have a nosebleed, let alone get blown up by an atomic bomb. He was explaining the first bomb to his supervisor when Bocks Car flew over Nagasaki. The Fat Man atomic bomb was dropped on to the city and Tamaguchi became the victim of a second atomic blast. He was three kilometers away from Ground Zero but was not able to get treatment for the injuries he had received in Hiroshima – for obvious reasons.

He was recognised as a hibakashu (one of those affected by the explosions) but only of the Nagasaki bomb – he kept his remarkable story to himself for many years. The Japanese government finally recognised his presence in both cities in 2009. He died of stomach cancer in January 2010.

We may not have heard the last of Tsutomu Yamaguchi. Several months before his death he met the film director James Cameron (of Titanic and Avatar fame). It seems that the director is keen to shoot Yamaguchi’s story – and it certainly does deserve more exposure. Let’s just hope that Celine Dion doesn’t sing the theme music.
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Tags: Atomic Bomb, Nagasaki, Yamaguchi Survivor, Survivors

Top Russian machine guns Russian Arms, Military Technology

Various weapons are very often exposed in movies nowadays. Here are legendary Russian machine guns having their own history ever shown in the Soviet (and not only) movies.

1. Maxim heavy machine gun model 1910. It was a first self-powered machine gun with water cooling of the barrel. Gun produced after 1940 were upgraded in such a way that coolant circuit could be loaded not only with water but with snow or ice. This gun could provide only automatic fire so it was extremely effective against infantry.

2. Degtyaryov hand-held infantry machine gun was used by the Soviet Army starting from the year 1927. It was one the few weapon models developed solely in the Soviet Union but not changed or modernized western samples. It appeared to be rather fail-safe and easy in use and maintenance and for this reason was widely used till the end of the World War 2. In its combat characteristics Degtyaryov’s gun excelled similar foreign analogs of that times.

3. Kalashnikov hand-held machine gun abbreviated in Russian as RPK was developed in mid-50’s when a national program on modernization of army weapons was launched. It was aimed to produce a reliable infantry assault rifle and a light machine gun which would be of a rather similar construction and with similar and interchangeable spare parts. A tender was held in 1961 to determine the best designed products. As a result the modernized AK-47 and unified with it RPK were introduced into the Soviet Army. By the way, speaking about its appearance in the movies, you should remember it from Rambo series.

4. Degtyaryov-Shpagin Large-Caliber (DShK) heavy anti-aircraft machine gun developed in the far 1938 is still in use. This weapon provided very fast fire but still with high accuracy which caused ti effective use in many campaigns from WW2 till Iraq in 2004. This was the gun John Rambo (him again) used to hit down enemy’s helicopters.

5. NSV heavy machine gun was a universal anti-infantry, anti-aircraft and anti-armored-carriers weapon designed in 1971 in order to replace DShK. Its production was ended immediately after the Collapse of the USSR. Now its modification is produced in Ukraine and several licenses for production have been sold abroad.

Tags: Top guns, Russian machine guns, Russian Arms, Military Technology

Famous painters copied photographs capture the moment

Photographs inspired impressionists to capture the moment, but did you know that some of the most famous paintings of Van Gogh, Toulouse Laurence or Paul Gauguin were inspired on an original photograph?

1. Paul Gauguin


2. Paul Cezanne


3. Toulouse Lautrec

4. Vincent Van Gogh



5. Edgar Degas


More info: Impressionism and photography

The World’s Longest Chocolate Bar

Make World’s Biggest and Longest Chocolate Bar I was in Rivarolo near Turin in Italy to judge the attempt to set a new Guinness World Records achievement for the longest chocolate bar. The attempt was organised by Teorema d’Immagine on behalf of Rivarolo Urban Center, a shopping mall which opened recently. A. Giordano, a local chocolatier, had been commissioned to make the chocolate bar, which was to be displayed outside the shopping mall.

I watched as the chocolatiers laid out the massive bar, and a large crowd gathered. When the bar was in place they decorated it and we waited for the mayor to arrive before taking measurements.

When I had finished taking measurements I stood back and prepared to talk to the crowd gathered around the attempt area. The length to beat was 6.98 metres. The bar measured a phenomenal 11.57 metres, and to rapturous applause and cheering I presented an official Guinness World Records certificate to conclude the successful attempt.

Source:- community.guinnessworldrecords.com

Wedding photography stupidly photoshopped pics

Tags: Wedding photography, stupidly photoshopped, Wedding photoshopped pics

How to make a paper bead necklace | beaded jewelry necklaces

Paper bead necklace is super easy to make. Decopatch paper, Things use to Deco patch glue (or other varnish glue like ModPodge), cotton paper beads, ribbon, wooden sticks, needle, glue pencil.





Tear pieces of Deco patch paper.



Tear them even smaller as we'll be working on
small paper beads so there will be less creases.



Take a wooden stick and stick it through the paper bead.
You can purchase the cotton paper balls in your local craft shop.



Put some glue in the lid of the jar.



Put some glue on the bead.



Dip your glue pencil in the glue and then pick up a tiny piece of paper with it.Stick it onto the bead and put some more glue over the piece of paper.
Then repeat until the bead is completely covered.



Let 'em dry.



I you like 'em shiny, then add another layer of varnish glue.



When they are dry, remove the beads from the sticks.



String the beads onto the ribbon.



And you're ready to go out!

Tags: Paper bead necklace, How to, Decopatch paper, beaded jewelry necklaces, cotton paper beads, ribbon, wooden sticks, needle, glue pencil.