Astrocyte

" Astrocytes look after the neurons around them, and the ends of their arms, called end-feet, wrap around tiny blood vessels and help control how much blood flows by.

Playground How to play Credits

This picture is a cloud of paint. You can , , , , , , and .

Shelf: Tiny World
Kind: Built from a recipe
Sound: Yes
Licenses: Own work (made in the page)

How to play

Tap it to send a calcium wave out along its arms.

Its controls

Control	Kind	Start
Send a calcium wave	Tap
Calcium wave	Button
Cell	Color	#35c79a

About it

An astrocyte is a star-shaped cell in the brain and spinal cord; its name means "star cell." Astrocytes look after the neurons around them, and the ends of their arms, called end-feet, wrap around tiny blood vessels and help control how much blood flows by.

Astrocytes pass messages to each other with waves of calcium, which scientists can watch with dyes that glow. Tap it to send one: a front of green light spreads from the middle out along every arm to the end-feet, and the blood vessel they hold widens for a moment. Faint waves pass by themselves now and then.

Details

Splats: Opens at 200,000 at Mid Detail, 59,998 at Low, and up to 890,000 at Max

Sources and credits

Made in Splashery. Its code is MIT.

Share it

This link opens it in the Playground. To put it on your own page, add the element and one script tag. Every option.

https://splashery.app/play/?toy=astrocyte

<script type="module" src="https://splashery.app/play/src/element.js"></script>
<splashery-toy toy="astrocyte"></splashery-toy>