Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • Books Received
  • Published:

A Textbook of Embryology

Abstract

THIS text-book by two Virginian embryologists has served a useful purpose in the past and will continue to do so in the future. It deals more particularly with human development, and the comparative method in deducing and interpreting the progressive changes is used but sparingly, the authors preferring generally to fill in lacunæ in our knowledge by postulating hypothetical stages rather than by referring to data derived from the study of other animals. In special cases, however, and more especially in describing the development of the fœtal membranes and their appendages, the comparative method is freely adopted. Furthermore, in the interpretation of vestigial and transitory structures full use is made of the 'law of recapitulation'. The separate section on “Laboratory Exercises” continues to be a feature of the work. The present edition does not differ materially from the last, but there are some additions, more particularly to the chapters on hæmopoiesis and sex determination, and certain errors in other parts of the book have been corrected. Of the errors which have been allowed to remain, those relating to ovulation, the corpus luteum and the sexual cycle are perhaps the most noticeable. Thus, the corpus hæmorrhagicum is described as the mass of clotted blood which fills the cavity of the ruptured ovarian follicle and constitutes the first stage in the formation of the corpus luteum. The name 'corpus hæmorrhagicum' or 'blood follicle' is now reserved for degenerate undischarged follicles which have never ruptured, and in the figure such a one is shown in the centre of the ovary and duly labelled. The lutein cells can scarcely be said to “invade the corpus hæmorrhagicum” since they are actually formed from the undischarged follicular epithelium, and the cells which grow inward from the wall are connective tissue elements, these giving rise to a network surrounding the enlarged lutein cells.

A Textbook of Embryology

By Prof. H. E. Jordan Prof. J. E. Kindred. Third edition. Pp. xiv + 613. (New York and London: D. Appleton-Century Co., Inc., 1937.) 25s. net.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Rent or buy this article

Prices vary by article type

from$1.95

to$39.95

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Authors

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

MARSHALL, F. A Textbook of Embryology. Nature 140, 949–950 (1937). https://doi.org/10.1038/140949a0

Download citation

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/140949a0

Search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing