A new study shows: Replicating 14-day embryo models from stem cells could revolutionize the view of early human development

A new study shows: Replicating 14-day embryo models from stem cells could revolutionize the view of early human development

A new landmark study has the potential to revolutionize the way we study human post-implantation development. To date, only limited insight into development after implantation in the uterus has been possible due to ethical and technical challenges. There was a lack of models that could recreate the spatially organized morphogenesis of all defined embryonic and extraembryonic tissues of the human post-implantation concept, such as the embryonic disc, the bilaminar disc, the yolk sac, and the chorionic sac along with surrounding trophoblasts.

All this is now changing thanks to recent research that showed that naive mouse embryonic stem cells can give rise to embryonic and extraembryonic stem cells. These cells were able to form themselves into morphogenetically structured embryonic models, known as structured stem cell-based embryo models (SEMs), which could mimic the postgastrular state.

These groundbreaking results have now been transferred to humans, and the special thing is that only genetically modified naive embryonic stem cells were used. These prominent human SEMs represent the organization of nearly all known lineages and compartments of post-implantation stages of the human embryo, including the epiblast, the hypoblast, the extraembryonic mesoderm, and the trophoblast surrounding these tissue layers.

What is exciting is that these fully integrated human SEMs also reflect the growth and developmental dynamics of post-implantation development up to 13-14 days after fertilization, i.e. Carnegie stage 6a. This includes the formation of the embryonic disc and the bilaminar disc, the lumenogenesis of the epiblast, the polarized amnion formation, the asymmetric division in the anterior-posterior direction, the specification of the primordial germ cells, the polarized formation of the yolk sac with visceral and parietal epithelium, the expansion of the extraembryonic Mesoderm, which defines the formation of a chorionic cavity and a connecting stalk, and finally a trophoblast with syncytium and lacune formation.

Thanks to this SEM platform, it will now be possible to experimentally explore previously inaccessible sections of early human post-implantation development. This opens up completely new possibilities in the field of naturopathy and gives us insights into processes that were previously obscure.

The study to which this article refers was published in the renowned journal “Nature”. For further information and in-depth information, we recommend the original source:

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