Key stage of human development
Despite significant biomedical advances in recent decades, the very earliest events of human development – those that occur during a critical window just after fertilization – have remained an unobservable mystery, until now.
New research from scientists at The Rockefeller University shows, for the first time, molecular and cellular processes in human development that occur up to day 14 after fertilization. Published in Nature on May 4, the breakthrough system is the first in which the process of implantation has successfully been replicated in an experimental setting, outside of the uterus. This novel technique vastly expands the ability to answer basic questions about our own development, as well as to understand early pregnancy loss.
Implantation is a crucial step in human development. Occurring shortly after fertilisation, implantation is the process by which the small, hollow ball of cells called a blastocyst attaches to the uterus, allowing an embryo to begin to take shape.
"This portion of human development was a complete black box," says Ali Brivanlou, Robert and Harriet Heilbrunn Professor and head of the Laboratory of Stem Cell Biology and Molecular Embryology. To shed light inside that box, the researchers overcame several key problems: they surrounded the blastocyst with just the right chemical environment, and provided a suitable scaffolding for it to attach to.
Previous research from co-author Magdalena Zernicka-Goetz and colleagues at the University of Cambridge established a similar method using mouse blastocysts, after multiple attempts to define the right combination of factors. This prompted Brivanlou and colleagues, including research associates Alessia Deglincerti and Gist Croft, research specialist Lauren Pietila, and fellow Rockefeller scientist Eric Siggia, Viola Ward Brinning and Elbert Calhoun Brinning Professor and head of the Laboratory of Theoretical Condensed Matter Physics, to adapt the technique and create an attachment culture for human embryos.
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