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Scientists made a six-legged mouse embryo — here’s why

A rodent with two extra limbs instead of genitals shows the crucial role of a gene pathway in determining the fate of a primordial structure.
  1. Sara Reardon

    1. Sara Reardon is a freelance journalist based in Bozeman, Montana.

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A composite of two images showing Images of a fixed control (left) and Tgfbr1-cKO (right) fetuses.

A typical mouse embryo (left) has four limbs. An embryo in which a particular gene was switched off halfway through development has six limbs, and several of its internal organs protrude from its abdomen. Credit: Anastasiia Lozovska et al/Nat. Comms

This six-legged animal isn’t an insect: it’s a mouse with two extra limbs where its genitals should be. Research on this genetically engineered rodent, which was published on 20 March in Nature Communications1, has revealed a way in which changes in DNA’s 3D structure can affect how embryos develop.

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Nature 628, 247 (2024)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-024-00943-7

References

  1. Lozovska, A. et al. Nature Commun. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-024-46870-z (2024).

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