The genomic compass of cell fate: how aneuploidy impacts the first week of human development
Abstract:

Human embryos are remarkably prone to mitotic errors during their first days of development: up to 70% carry genetically abnormal cells by the third day. In the first part of this seminar, I will cover the journey we all made from a chaotic genetic content to a (mostly) normal genome, summarizing what we know on how we manage this feat. In the second half, I will move on to human embryonic stem cells, the in vitro counterpart of the inner cell mass – the part of the embryo that becomes the fetus. Embryonic stem cells are also prone to genomic instability, which my lab studies from multiple angles. In this talk, I will present some of the work we do, and show you the opportunities these abnormalities provide to discover gene function in cell fate specification, during a window of human development otherwise inaccessible.
Date: 11 April 2024, 14:00 (Thursday, -1st week, Trinity 2024)
Venue: This event is hybrid
Speaker: Professor Claudia Spits (Vrije Universiteit Brussel)
Organising department: Nuffield Department of Women's and Reproductive Health
Organisers: Michael Suttie (NDWRH, University of Oxford), Dr Lydia Coxon (NDWRH, University of Oxford)
Organiser contact email address: seminars@wrh.ox.ac.uk
Host: Prof Jo Poulton (Nuffield Department of Women's & Reproductive Health, University of Oxford )
Booking required?: Recommended
Booking email: seminars@wrh.ox.ac.uk
Audience: Members of the University only
Editor: Isobel Way