References & Sources

Twirl Those Organs into Place

Getting to the heart of how a heart knows left from right

The motion of hairlike structures inside a growing embryo may guide the placement of our internal organs.

References:

Afzelius, A.B. 1976. A human syndrome caused by immotile cilia. Science 193(July 23):317.

Nonaka, S. . . . and N. Hirokawa. 1998. Randomization of left-right asymmetry due to loss of nodal cilia generating leftward flow of extraembryonic fluid in mice lacking KIF3B motor protein. Cell 95(Dec. 11):829.

Noone, P.G., et al. 1999. Discordant organ laterality in monozygotic twins with Primary Ciliary Dyskinesia. American Journal of Medical Genetics 82:155.

Sulik, K., et al. 1994. Morphogenesis of the murine node and notochordal plate. Developmental Dynamics 201:260.

Supp, D.M. . . . S.S. Potter., and M. Brueckner. 1997. Mutation of an axonemal dynein affects left-right asymmetry in inversus viscerum mice. Nature 389(Oct. 30):863.

Further Readings:

Levin, M., and M. Mercola. 1998. The compulsion of chirality: Toward an understanding of left-right asymmetry. Genes & Development 12:763.

Travis, J. 1997. Two genes help an embryo pick sides. Science News 152(Nov. 15):311.

______. 1997. Gene tells left from right. Science News 152(July 26):56.

Vogan, K.J., and C.J. Tabin. 1999. A new spin on handed asymmetry. Nature 397(Jan. 28):295.

For more information on immotile cilia syndrome, see http://www.cheo.on.ca/pcd/pcdtell.htm.

For more information on 9+1 cilia, see http://www.members.global2000.net/bowser/cilia.html.

For movies of "nodal flow," see http://www.cell.com/cgi/content/full/95/6/829/DCI.

Sources:

Björn A. Afzelius
Stockholm University
Wenner-Gren Institute
S-113 45 Stockholm
Sweden

Samuel S. Bowser
New York State Department of Health
Wadsworth Center
ESP-Post Office Box 509
Albany, NY 12201-0509

Martina Brueckner
Yale University
Department of Pediatrics/Cardiology
New Haven, CT 06520

Nobutaka Hirokawa
University of Tokyo
Graduate School of Medicine
Department of Cell Biology and Anatomy
7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyoku
Tokyo 113-0033
Japan

Mark Mercola
Harvard Medical School
Department of Cell Biology
240 Longwood Avenue
Boston, MA 02115

Peadar G. Noone
University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Department of Medicine
Pulmonary Division
CB 7248
Chapel Hill, NC 27599-7249

Paul Overbeek
Baylor College of Medicine
One Baylor Plaza
Houston, TX 77030

S. Steven Potter
Children’s Hospital Research Foundation
Division of Development Biology
Cincinnati, OH 45229

Kathleen Sulik
University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Birth Defects Center
Chapel Hill, NC 27599

Dorothy M. Supp
Shriner’s Hospital
3229 Burnet Avenue
Cincinnati, OH 45229-3095

Cliff Tabin
Harvard Medical School
Warren Alpert Building, 4th Floor
200 Longwood Avenue
Boston, MA 02115

Lewis Wolpert
University College London
Department of Anatomy
Gower Street
London, UK WC1E 6BT

Joseph H. Yost
University of Utah
Huntsman Cancer Institute
15 North 2030 E-Room 3410
Salt Lake City, UT 84112-5330

From Science News, Vol. 156, No. 8, August 21, 1999, p. 124. Copyright © 1999, Science Service.