Abstract
By virtue of its inaccessible nature, mammalian implantation stage development has remained one of the most enigmatic and hard to investigate periods of embryogenesis. Derived from pluripotent stem cells, gastruloids recapitulate key aspects of gastrula-stage embryos and have emerged as a powerful in vitro tool to study the architectural features of early post-implantation embryos. While the majority of the work in this emerging field has focused on the use of gastruloids to model embryogenesis, their tractable nature and suitability for high-throughput scaling, has presented an unprecedented opportunity to investigate both developmental and environmental aberrations to the embryo as they occur in vitro. This review summarises the recent developments in the use of gastruloids to model congenital anomalies, their usage in teratogenicity testing, and the current limitations of this emerging field.
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This work was supported by the South African National Research Foundation (M.G., Competitive Support for Unrated Researchers, A.A. Postgraduate MSc Scholarship) and the University of Cape Town (M.G., Research Development Grant, S.R., Building Research Active Grant).
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MG conceived and designed the study. AA and SR performed the literature review and wrote the first draft of the manuscript. All authors contributed to the reading, editing and approval of the final manuscript.
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Amel, A., Rossouw, S. & Goolam, M. Gastruloids: A Novel System for Disease Modelling and Drug Testing. Stem Cell Rev and Rep 19, 104–113 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12015-022-10462-5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12015-022-10462-5