Unfolding gastrulation

Vertebrate gastrulation.

Our understanding of the mechanisms that control gastrulation is still in its infancy. One problem is that gastrulation is a complex set of coordinated behaviours involving directional cell movements, several types of cell interactions, changes in cell fate and gene expression. Therefore, the successful analysis of its control mechanisms requires simultaneous analysis of more than one of these,...

Evolution of gastrulation

Gastrulation in Xenopus

The process of gastrulation [6] allows for the formation of the germ layers [7] in metazoan embryos, and is generally achieved through a series of complex and coordinated cellular movements. The process of gastrulation [6] can be either diploblastic or triploblastic. In diploblastic organisms like cnidaria or ctenophora, only the endoderm [8] and the ectoderm [9] form; in triploblastic organism...

Adhesive Crosstalk in Gastrulation

lation. Recent studies show that signaling through integrin As a first step in describing the nature of the crosstalk receptors is required for normal cell movements durbetween integrin and C-cadherin, Marsden and DeSiing Xenopus gastrulation. Integrins function in this mone present evidence that integrin-mediated homoprocess by modulating the activity of cadherin adhetypic cell binding in diff...

Gastrulation: Wnts Signal Constriction

Recent work shows that Wnt signaling directly regulates the apical constriction that drives gastrulation movements in Caenorhabditis elegans, and also promotes invagination in sea urchins, providing a novel and possibly conserved mode of developmental regulation.