Fig. 4.

Extended cardiac health span in SPARC heterozygous flies.

(A) The adult beating heart was imaged in semi-intact preparations and functional parameters measured from videos captured at ~ 120 frames per second. The m-modes show heart contractions over a 12 s period. M-modes from two different flies of each genotype, control (w¹¹¹⁸) and mutant (SPARC^MI00329 heterozygotes) are show for each age (1 and 6 weeks old). Older wild type flies exhibit a disrupted heart rhythm, however this does not occur in SPARC^MI00329 heterozygotes. (B) Quantified data for heart function showing that the age-dependent decline in heart function recorded in the wild types (black lines) does not develop in SPARC^+/− flies (red lines). Graphs show mean ± SEM for each parameter. *P < 0.001, there is an age-related change in the parameter; ^#P < 0.01 there is a difference between genotypes by 2-way-ANOVA, n = 20–50 flies per genotype, per time-point.