Structural Organization and Embryonic Differentiation

Abstract

Publisher Summary In the development of a living organism complexity arises in the form of cellular differentiation. Cellular differentiation involves biochemical events which bring about synthesis of tissue-specific proteins, such as cellular proteins or enzymic complements characterizing the cell types. The differential activity of the genes, which is responsible for changing the character of different parts of the embryo, is itself a result of a series of interactions between the genetic material and the cytoplasmic environment. Thus primary proteins which may be formed interacts with the genes; this interaction leads to further differentiation of that region. This means, from the time of the initial interactions, there occur a need for restriction of certain substances or biosynthetic activities to particular regions of the embryo. This chapter focuses on structural organization and embryonic differentiation, and discusses the structural changes during neural tissue differentiation, structural changes during differentiation of lens, and structural changes during differentiation of other tissues.