In 2012, an unprecedented rhythm took hold of a patient's heart ❤️ at Saint Vincent Hospital in Worcester, Mass., pushing it to 600 beats per minute, about 10 times the usual rate. Learn more about this bizarre story and more on the human heart at
Sign up for our email newsletter for the latest science newsThe heart is perhaps the body’s most resilient organ and, along with the brain, its most essential. The female heart, which weighs about eight ounces, beats, pumping blood with roughly the force needed to squeeze a tennis ball. That’s enough blood in an 80-year lifetime to fill 100 Olympic-sized swimming pools.
“The heart blows the brain away,” says Gary Lopaschuk, a professor at the Cardiovascular Research Centre at the University of Alberta. “The heart is probably the most aerobic organ you have.”The heart’s sole purpose is to contract, sending blood down 60,000 miles of blood vessels every day. It’s so dedicated to this mission that it will continue to beat even after the brain has died, as is the case with– bodies kept alive with oxygen and nutrients so the organs can be harvested for transplants.
To protect itself against a shortfall, the heart works by receiving steady infusions of oxygenated blood from the nearby lungs. To further safeguard itself, the“The heart is an omnivore,” says Lopaschuk. “It will use pretty much any fuel.”account for up to 90 percent of ATP production as they provide a reliable source of energy, but the heart has a backup plan. During times of malnutrition, it taps into glucose reserves and recycles lactate molecules to come up with the energy it needs.
And barring death or other complications, the process never stops. Pacemaker cells repeatedly absorb sodium ions, causing them to fire as neurons do and send out signal after signal.describes an experiment in which researchers cultivated cardiac cells from human stem cells and watched as they “self-assembled into a thin, spontaneously beating” piece of cardiac tissue. This proto-organ beat at about 70 beats per minute, well within the normal range, for about a month.
South Africa Latest News, South Africa Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Italian ex-PM Berlusconi in intensive care with heart problemsSilvio Berlusconi, who was Italian prime minister four times, is in intensive care in a cardiac unit at Milan's San Raffaele Hospital, sources say
Read more »
Essay | The Man Who Demystified the Human HeartWhen the pioneering anatomist William Harvey got the chance to touch a living man's exposed heart, it confirmed his theory that the organ wasn't the seat of the soul, but a simple pump
Read more »
Some Diets Better Than Others for Heart ProtectionA comprehensive analysis suggests the Mediterranean diet and low-fat diets can reduce the risk of death or MI, and the Mediterranean diet may also protect against stroke.
Read more »
North Pole man, once stymied by blizzard, finally gets a new heartA North Pole man who was delayed by bad weather on his way to Seattle for a heart transplant in December finally got a new heart over the weekend.
Read more »
Hotel Le Fitz Roy review: A luxury escape in the French alpsA five-star, wellness oasis with spectacular views in the heart of Val Thorens
Read more »
Titans fan comes out of coma after suffering heart attack following Titans-Jaguars gameSeven weeks. That’s how long a Tennessee Titans fan had been in a medically induced coma after she suffered a heart attack leaving the Titans-Jaguars game in early January.
Read more »