Microcirculation of the heart.

Abstract

The first glimpse on the importance of the coronary microcirculation can be ascribed to William Harvey, who, although he never visualized capillaries, reasoned by necessity, that there must be pathways for the flow of blood from the smallest visible arteries to the smallest visible veins (1). In his De motu cordis he says, “Since calculations and visual demonstrations have confirmed all my suppositions, to wit, that the blood is passed through the lungs and heart by the pulsation of the ventricles, is forcibly ejected to all parts of the body, therein, steals into the veins and the porosities of the flesh, flows back everywhere through those very veins from the circumference to the center, from small veins into larger ones, and then comes at last into the vena cava and to the auricle of the heart”. What he calls “porosities of the flesh” are the capillaries.KeywordsBeating HeartCountercurrent FlowCoronary MicrocirculationAtrial MusclePlasma Flow RateThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.