First 3D mapping in the embryo

3D light-sheet microscope image of a 12-week-old transparent human embryo eye. The 6 oculomotor muscles responsible for eye movement and the 3 motor nerves (in white, green and red) were colorized using virtual reality software. ©Raphael Blain/Alain Chédotal, Institut de la Vision (Inserm/CNRS/Sorbonne Université) - Improving our knowledge of the development of the complex structures that make up the human head, and thus gaining a better understanding of the congenital anomalies that cause malformations: this is the challenge that a team of researchers from Inserm, CNRS and Sorbonne Université at the Institut de la vision, Université Claude Bernard Lyon 1 and Hospices civils de Lyon is well on the way to meeting. Thanks to an innovative technique that makes cranial structures transparent and then takes 3D photos of the cells that make them up, this research team has been able to establish the very first three-dimensional map of the embryonic human head. These results, to be published in Cell , have already led to a better understanding of how certain complex structures of the head are formed, such as the lacrimal and salivary glands or the arteries of the head and neck. They pave the way for new tools for studying embryonic development. The head is the most complex structure in the human body.