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Development before birth, or prenatal development (from Latin natalis 'relating to birth') is the process in which a zygote, and later an embryo, and then a fetus develops during gestation. Prenatal development starts with fertilization and the formation of the zygote , the first stage in embryonic development which continues in fetal ...
The picture attracted a lot of attention when it was released, as it was used by opponents of abortion who asserted that the baby reached through the womb and grabbed the doctor's hand, thus showing signs of life at the 21st week of pregnancy. Indeed, the photograph and many of the texts which often accompany it seem to support this view ...
Different terms are used to describe prenatal development, meaning development before birth. A term with the same meaning is the "antepartum" (from Latin ante "before" and parere "to give birth") Sometimes "antepartum" is however used to denote the period between the 24th/26th week of gestational age until birth, for example in antepartum ...
Human embryology is the study of this development during the first eight weeks after fertilization. The normal period of gestation (pregnancy) is about nine months or 36 weeks. The germinal stage refers to the time from fertilization through the development of the early embryo until implantation is completed in the uterus.
Tooth buds, which will form the baby teeth, appear. The limbs are long and thin. The fetus can make a fist with its fingers. Genitals appear well differentiated. Red blood cells are produced in the liver. Heartbeat can be detected by ultrasound. [7]
During continued fetal development, the early body systems, and structures that were established in the embryonic stage continue to develop. Sex organs begin to appear during the third month of gestation. The fetus continues to grow in both weight and length, although the majority of the physical growth occurs in the last weeks of pregnancy.
The development of a zygote into a multicellular embryo proceeds through a series of recognizable stages, often divided into cleavage, blastula, gastrulation, and organogenesis. [ 6 ] Cleavage is the period of rapid mitotic cell divisions that occur after fertilization.
Fertilization was not understood in antiquity. Hippocrates believed that the embryo was the product of male semen and a female factor. Aristotle held that only male semen gave rise to an embryo, while the female only provided a place for the embryo to develop, [5] a concept he acquired from the preformationist Pythagoras.