Very happy to share the work of Huanhuan Li et al. While not a natural embryo, you might not have known that if I hadn’t told you.

RT @CellCellPress: Now online! A complete model of mouse embryogenesis through organogenesis enabled by chemically induced embryo founder….

A big thanks to all authors, especially Professor Naihe Jing and Penglei Shen for guiding our embryo model into organogenesis, and to our PhD students Jiahui Huang and Wei Guan for their efforts. And of course, to Huanhuan Li, the driving force behind this work.

Starting from PSCs, a brief reprogramming step gives rise to embryo founder-like cells. These segregate embryonic and extraembryonic lineages and self-organize to closely mirror natural embryo development, both morphologically and at the molecular level.

RT @mercedesbarrero: Very happy to share that my PhD first author paper is now online in Science Advances! (here th….

Of course, there’s plenty more data in the preprint that isn't covered in this thread. Check it out, there’s even a paragraph dedicated to X-inactivation aficionados like myself!.

And the superstars behind the study are: @huan_li908, JiaHui, Wei, Haiping, @jywu_wu, @PandaChuanxin, @olidailyflash, Haiyong and our collaborator Jian Zhang at Yunnan University.

Overall, our single-cell transcriptome analysis revealed that chemical induction, starting from ESCs, faithfully recapitulates the complex lineage branching and developmental patterns observed in embryo development, underscoring the potential of ci-MOs to model embryogenesis.

We also observed that ci-MOs exhibit advanced trophoblast lineage development, which includes the presence of EPC cell derivatives.

Day 4.5 ci-MOs display high-fidelity E7.5 molecular signature. Check comparison to natural embryo!

One day more (day 4.5) and ci-MOs mimic the morphological and molecular characteristics of the natural embryo at E7.5.

After that, we simply let the cells self-organize and develop…and the results are stunning! Take a look at how they appear after just 3.5 days!

Cells reprogram into an earlier, more plastic developmental stage within 60-hours. After that, and within 36 hours, they develop into one of the three late blastocyst (E4.5-like) fates

We aimed to create “embryo founder-like” cells using a candidate chemical-only screen. We evaluated the ability of these compounds to induce Cdx2 and Gata6 expression in pluripotent stem cells while maintaining Oct4 expression. Check out the manuscript for the details!

Delighted to introduce our chemically induced embryo model (ci-MO). This is direct, rapid, efficient, advanced and high-fidelity. Start with any ESCs and in just 8 days you are here (see picture). ✨ Dive into the concept in the 🧵below! 🚀

What are they up to? 🤔. Sneaky smiles, huh? I'll get to the bottom of it ……. 😏 Stay tuned for more antics!!

Would like to add this one as well:

(8/8) Our findings provide insights into the biology of blastoid formation and highlight an inherent plasticity to hnPSCs, which can dedifferentiate into E5-like cells which subsequently segregate blastocyst-like cell fate(s).

(7/8) Spontaneous blastoids are a useful model to study post-implantation development. These contain the cell types you would expect in equivalent stages of human embryonic development (CS6-7).

(6/8) As we had previously demonstrated for mouse embryos ( hypoblast specification in spontaneous blastoids is also prevented by the presence of Mek/Erk signal inhibitors. Following their removal hypoblast specification proceeds.