Descriptions of the embryo go back at least to the time of Aristotle, but it has only been since the late 19 th century and early 20 th century that advances in experimental approaches allowed ...

How does a tiny cluster of cells become an embryo with a head, trunk, and tail? And how do thousands of genes coordinate this development?

A team of scientists has identified an unexpected embryonic "starting point" for several brown-fat depots: a small cell niche around the dorsal aorta. Using a combination of time-controlled genetic ...

Though more than 8 million babies have been born through in vitro fertilization (IVF), 70% of IVF implantations fail. As IVF is becoming a more common route to pregnancy in cases of infertility, there ...

Changes in cellular metabolites have been shown to regulate embryonic stem cell development at the earliest stages of life. Metabolites are simple compounds generated during life-sustaining chemical ...

Live imaging of embryos at different stages. Chromosomes are labeled in magenta. 4-cell sister blastomeres are shown, along with 3D-reconstructed images of 2-to-4-cell and 4-to-8-cell divisions.

As nearly one in six couples experience fertility issues, in-vitro fertilization (IVF) is an increasingly common form of reproductive technology. However, there are still many unanswered scientific ...

Study finds that large embryo cells divide step by step using a mechanical ratchet system, challenging the textbook idea of a ...

Image of mouse embryos at the 2-cell stage visualised by light microscopy. Two blastomeres (cells) can be seen inside the zona pellucida (a “shell-like” protective outer layer) of each embryo. Credit: ...

Speaking at a recent meeting of the British Pharmacological Society in Brighton, UK, Christine Mummery described how using embryonic stem cells to create human heart cells could b ...