From One Cell to a Body – The Science of Development

A single fertilised cell, in the space of months, becomes a fully formed body with a beating heart, a working brain and everything else in roughly the right place — without a blueprint, a builder or a supervisor. This episode traces how cell division, gene expression and chemical signals called morphogens turn one starting cell into trillions of specialised ones, arranged with remarkable precision.

You'll come away understanding how differentiation works at the level of genes, what a morphogen gradient is and why it matters, what stem-cell potency means, why development is surprisingly robust to small disturbances, and where and why it can go wrong.

Talking Science is sponsored by Kinsoft. Visit www.kinsoft.com.au

Further reading: Nature – reviews on developmental biology and morphogen signalling; Royal Society – publications on embryonic development; Scientific American – features on stem cells and embryology.