Source: University of Florida
Date: June 9, 2008
Summary:
Researchers studying embryonic stem cells have explored the first fork in the developmental road, getting a new look at what happens when fertilized eggs differentiate to build either an embryo or a placenta. By manipulating a specific gene in a mouse blastocyst — the structure that develops from a fertilized egg but is not yet an actual embryo — scientists with the University of Florida's McKnight Brain Institute and the Harvard Stem Cell Institute caused cells destined to build an embryo to instead change direction and build the cell mass that leads to the placenta.
