The bulbus cordis (the bulb of the heart) is a part of the
developing heart that lies ventral to the
primitive ventricle after the
heart
The heart is a muscular Organ (biology), organ found in humans and other animals. This organ pumps blood through the blood vessels. The heart and blood vessels together make the circulatory system. The pumped blood carries oxygen and nutrie ...
assumes its S-shaped form. The superior end of the bulbus cordis is also called the conotruncus.
Structure
In the early
tubular heart, the bulbus cordis is the major outflow pathway.
It receives blood from the
primitive ventricle, and passes it to the
truncus arteriosus
The truncus arteriosus is a structure that is present during embryonic development. It is an arterial trunk that originates from both ventricles of the heart that later divides into the aorta and the pulmonary trunk.
Structure
The truncus arteri ...
.
After
heart looping, it is located slightly to the left of the ventricle.
Development
The early bulbus cordis is formed by the fifth week of
development
Development or developing may refer to:
Arts
*Development (music), the process by which thematic material is reshaped
* Photographic development
*Filmmaking, development phase, including finance and budgeting
* Development hell, when a proje ...
. The truncus arteriosus is derived from it later.
The adjacent walls of the bulbus cordis and ventricle approximate, fuse, and finally disappear, and the bulbus cordis now communicates freely with the
right ventricle
A ventricle is one of two large chambers located toward the bottom of the heart that collect and expel blood towards the peripheral beds within the body and lungs. The blood pumped by a ventricle is supplied by an atrium (heart), atrium, an adjace ...
, while the junction of the bulbus with the
truncus arteriosus
The truncus arteriosus is a structure that is present during embryonic development. It is an arterial trunk that originates from both ventricles of the heart that later divides into the aorta and the pulmonary trunk.
Structure
The truncus arteri ...
is brought directly ventral to and applied to the
atrial canal
The atrium (; : atria) is one of the two upper chambers in the heart that receives blood from the circulatory system. The blood in the atria is pumped into the heart ventricles through the atrioventricular mitral and tricuspid heart valves.
...
.
By the upgrowth of the
ventricular septum
The interventricular septum (IVS, or ventricular septum, or during development septum inferius) is the stout wall separating the ventricles, the lower chambers of the heart, from one another.
The interventricular septum is directed obliquely b ...
the bulbus cordis is separated from the
left ventricle
A ventricle is one of two large chambers located toward the bottom of the heart that collect and expel blood towards the peripheral beds within the body and lungs. The blood pumped by a ventricle is supplied by an atrium, an adjacent chamber in t ...
, but remains an integral part of the right ventricle, of which it forms the
infundibulum An infundibulum (Latin for ''funnel''; plural, ''infundibula'') is a funnel-shaped cavity or organ.
Anatomy
* Brain: the pituitary stalk, also known as the ''infundibulum'' and ''infundibular stalk'', is the connection between the hypothalamus an ...
.
Together, the bulbus cordis and the primitive ventricle give rise to the
ventricles of the formed heart.
Other animals
The bulbus cordis is shared in the development of many animals, including
frog
A frog is any member of a diverse and largely semiaquatic group of short-bodied, tailless amphibian vertebrates composing the order (biology), order Anura (coming from the Ancient Greek , literally 'without tail'). Frog species with rough ski ...
s
and
fish
A fish (: fish or fishes) is an aquatic animal, aquatic, Anamniotes, anamniotic, gill-bearing vertebrate animal with swimming fish fin, fins and craniate, a hard skull, but lacking limb (anatomy), limbs with digit (anatomy), digits. Fish can ...
.
Additional images
File:Gray460.png, Head of chick embryo of about thirty-eight hours' incubation, viewed from the ventral surface. X 26
File:Gray461.png, Diagram to illustrate the simple tubular condition of the heart.
File:Gray462.png, Heart of human embryo of about fourteen days.
File:Gray977.png, Human embryo about fifteen days old. Brain and heart represented from right side. Digestive tube and yolk sac in median section.
References
External links
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Embryology of cardiovascular system
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