These pictures are of cardiomyocytes, which are heart muscle cells. They contain a highly organized contractile network (cyan), called the sarcomere, and nuclei (magenta). These cells are responsible for pumping blood throughout the body for the duration of life. Our lab is trying to understand how cell metabolism impacts the formation of the contractile network of the cardiomyocyte during development.

This image is of cardiomyocytes that were differentiated from human induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs). Being able to image sarcomere assembly in living cells at this resolution would not be possible without this stem cell technology.