An appreciation of anatomy in the molecular world

Robert H. Anderson is one of the most important and accomplished cardiac anatomists of the last decades, having made major contributions to our understanding of the anatomy of normal hearts and the pathologies of acquired and congenital heart diseases. While cardiac anatomy as a research discipline has become largely subservient to molecular biology, anatomists like Professor Anderson demonstrate anatomy has much to offer. Here, we provide cases of early anatomical insights on the heart that were rediscovered, and expanded on, by molecular techniques: Migration of neural crest cells to the heart was deduced from histological observations (1908) and independently shown again with experimental interventions; pharyngeal mesoderm is added to the embryonic heart (1973) in what is now defined as the molecularly distinguishable second heart field; chambers develop from the heart tube as regional pouches in what is now considered the ballooning model by the molecular identification of regional differentiation and proliferation. The anatomical discovery of the conduction system by Purkinje, His, Tawara, Keith, and Flack is a special case because the main findings were never neglected in later molecular studies. Professor Anderson has successfully demonstrated that sound knowledge of anatomy is indispensable for proper understanding of cardiac development.