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Scientists program stem cells to mimic first days of embryonic development
Using CRISPR-based engineering methods to prompt stem cells to organize into embryo-like structures, scientists at UC Santa Cruz were able to create “programmable” cellular models of embryos without ever experimenting with any actual embryos.
For some animals, the entire process of cellular multiplication, generation of specialized cells, and their organization into an ordered multicellular embryo takes place in the protective environment of the uterus, making direct observation and studies challenging. This project, led by UCSC postdoctoral scholar Gerrald Lodewijk and biomolecular engineering alumna and current Caltech graduate student Sayaka Kozuki, used mouse stem cells that are commonly grown in the lab to guide them to form basic building blocks of the embryo. As an example, the researchers demonstrated how certain tissues form or are hindered during early development, but their methods could be used to study a wide range of genes and their cascading effects on the cell types.
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