The vascular anatomy of the developing zebrafish: An atlas of embryonic and early larval development

We have used confocal microangiography to examine and describe the vascular anatomy of the developing zebrafish, Danio rerio. This method and the prof ound optical clarity of zebrafish embryos make it possible to view the enti re developing vasculature with unprecedented resolution. A staged series of three-dimensional images of the vascular system were collected beginning s hortly after the onset of circulation at 1 day postfertilization through ea rly- to midlarval stages at approximately 7 days postfertilization. Blood v essels in every region of the animal were imaged at each stage, and detaile d "wiring patterns" were derived describing the interconnections between ev ery major vessel. We present an overview of these data here in this paper a nd in an accompanying Web site "The interactive atlas of zebrafish vascular anatomy" online at (http://eclipse.nichd.nih.gov/nichd/lmg/redirect.html). We find a highly dynamic but also highly stereotypic pattern of vascular: connections, with different sets of primitive embryonic vessels severing co nnections and rewiring in new configurations according to a reproducible pl an. We also find that despite variation in the details of the vascular anat omy, the basic vascular plan of the developing zebrafish shows strong simil arity to that of other vertebrates. This atlas will provide an invaluable f oundation for future genetic and experimental studies of vascular developme nt in the zebrafish.