- Title: UNITED KINGDOM: Cambridge scientists film embryo implantation for the first time
- Date: 10th March 2014
- Summary: CAMBRIDGE, ENGLAND, UK (FEBRUARY 27, 2014) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF PROFESSOR OF DEVELOPMENTAL BIOLOGY, MAGDALENA ZERNICKA-GOETZ, UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE, VIEWING EMBRYO IMAGERY ON LAPTOP (SOUNDBITE) (English) PROFESSOR OF DEVELOPMENTAL BIOLOGY, MAGDALENA ZERNICKA-GOETZ, (PRON: SJERRA-NEE-TZKA GERTZ), OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE, SAYING: "Embryo when it's burying itself in the mother it really hides from the ability to be observed by us, and this is the time when the major reshaping happens, so from relatively simple ball of cells which all look relatively similar to each other. Suddenly the foundation for the future body becomes established and this happens within 24 hours to 48 hours." VARIOUS OF FEMALE RESEARCHER MOVING EMBRYOS AROUND PETRI DISH BY BLOWING THEM THROUGH A TUBE ATTACHED TO A MICROPIPETTE, WHILE LOOKING THROUGH MICROSCOPE MINISCULE EMBRYOS PRE-IMPLANTATION INSIDE GELS IN PETRI DISH EMBRYOS SEEN THROUGH MICROSCOPE (SOUNDBITE) (English) PROFESSOR OF DEVELOPMENTAL BIOLOGY, MAGDALENA ZERNICKA-GOETZ, (PRON: SJERRA-NEE-TZKA GERTZ), OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE, SAYING: "The gel on which they grow has to be mimicking the lining of the uterus, of course, to make them happy, but also have to be thin enough and transparent so that light will go through and allow us to film them. And we also make use of embryos in which specific important proteins are tagged with fluorescent markers, so when we shine light with specific wavelengths we can see the behaviour of these proteins and because of that we can see what the cells do."
- Embargoed: 25th March 2014 12:00
- Keywords:
- Location: United Kingdom
- City:
- Country: United Kingdom
- Topics: Health,Science / Technology
- Reuters ID: LVA7V3J5RKP4RRIJSHR6KVZ6EXGA
- Aspect Ratio:
- Story Text: Cambridge University biologists have cracked the so-called 'black box' of embryonic development, a mystery which has long puzzled scientists. The researchers have found a way to record the earliest stages of an embryo's growth and have filmed for the first time ever, the moment of implantation, opening new possibilities for improved methods of IVF treatment and regenerative medicine.
The so-called 'black box' of embryonic development - its actual implantation, when the embryo attaches to the wall of the uterus - has always been a mystery to scientists, subject to educated guesswork. Now, for the first time, a University of Cambridge developmental biologist and her assistant have discovered a way to film the crucial moment, opening up a potential new world of embryonic discovery.
Professor Magdalena Zernicka-Goetz's method will allow scientists to study embryo growth and its development at implantation for the first time. This could help improve the success of in vitro fertilisation (IVF), and extend human knowledge of stem cells, advancing their use in regenerative medicine.
Embryo development in mammals occurs in two phases. In the implantation stage the embryo is a small, free-floating ball of cells called a blastocyst. In the second, post-implantation, phase the blastocyst embeds itself in the mother's uterus.
Studying implantation has long been the Holy Grail for embryologists because the embryo undergoes radical changes in a very short space of time. While blastocysts can be grown and studied outside the body, it has never before been possible to study the moment of implantation.
"(The) embryo when it's burying itself in the mother it really hides from the ability to be observed by us, and this is the time when the major reshaping happens, so from relatively simple ball of cells which all look relatively similar to each other. Suddenly the foundation for the future body becomes established and this happens within 24 hours to 48 hours," said Zernicka-Goetz Despite being warned by fellow academics that the project would prove too difficult, Zernicka-Goetz succeeded in finding a method to culture, film, and, as a result, study mouse embryos at this developmental stage. After five years of work Zernicka-Goetz and her team of scientists created transparent gel, containing extracellular-matrix proteins, which are normally found concentrated in membranes on the outside of cells. The gel had similar elasticity to uterine tissue, and when placed in a chemical solution with similar chemical and biological properties to the fluid in the mouse uterus, embryos would implant into it. Crucially the gel was transparent to optical light, allowing them to film the embryo during implantation.
According to Zernicka-Goetz, "the gel on which they grow has to be mimicking the lining of the uterus, of course, to make them happy, but also have to be thin enough and transparent so that light will go through and allow us to film them. And we also make use of embryos in which specific important proteins are tagged with fluorescent markers, so when we shine light with specific wavelengths we can see the behaviour of these proteins and because of that we can see what the cells do."
Her new method, published in the journal Cell, reveals that on its way from ball to cup, the blastocyst becomes a 'rosette' of wedge-shaped cells, a structure never before seen by scientists.
"We essentially found out that this organisation of those cells into these beautiful rose-like structures with petals organised in the same orientation is the starting point for our body and actually we find out also recently that it's a starting point for those cells uniformly to differentiate into the specific cell types, so now we can use it also hopefully in the future when we would like to make particular types of cells for regenerative medicine," said Zernicka-Goetz.
The rosette shows what a mouse looks like on the fourth day of its embryonic life, and Zernicka-Goetz says it's likely that a human embryo looks similar after seven days.
Her method could help improve the success of IVF, and extend our knowledge of stem cells, which could advance their use in regenerative medicine. Nobel Prize winning developmental biologist Sir John Gurdon, whom Zernicka-Goetz regards as her mentor, calls her work "a great advance"
"There are of course defects which occur when human embryos develop, sometimes things go wrong, and if one knows....whenever one knows more about the mechanism involved it always makes it possible to begin to find ways of getting round some of the difficulties that occur. So any basic knowledge about how mammalian embryos develop is undoubtedly valuable," said Gurdon.
Zernicka-Goetz asserts that the work of herself and and Dr Ivan Bedzhov demonstrate how stem cells have an inherent ability to organise themselves into a "beautiful" rosette from which the body will develop. The fluid filled amniotic cavity forms naturally at the centre of this rosette as its cellular petals part company - and not as a result of cell death, as previous orthodoxy claimed. She says that existing developmental biology text books will all need to be rewritten. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
- Copyright Notice: (c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2014. Open For Restrictions - http://about.reuters.com/fulllegal.asp
- Usage Terms/Restrictions: None