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Telstra adds one million mobile services, but Sensis plummets

Telstra has revealed the addition of almost one million new mobile services in the six months to December 2011, but Sensis revenues plummeted 24 percent in 12 months.

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And the heartbeat goes on ... and now we know why

Science - Biology



Previously the medical community thought that both actin and myosin must be “activated” in order to produce the force needed to produce a heartbeat.

However, this study shows that calcium ions only need to activate actin in order to produce a heartbeat.

The Sun team used laboratory rats to study the beat of their hearts.

They attached fluorescent probes to the filaments in order to study the mechanism that controlled their hearts.

This study concluded that “… although myosin binding can switch on thin filaments in rigor conditions, it does not contribute significantly under physiological conditions. The physiological mechanism of co-operative Ca2+ regulation of cardiac contractility must therefore be intrinsic to the thin filaments.”

The New Scientist article “Secret to a beating heart revealed” provides additional information. [subscription needed]

Additional information on How Does Muscles Work? is found on the website of Dr. Malcohm Irving, one of the authors of the study.

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