How embryo and mother come together

Cells-in-Motion supports interdisciplinary research project of Britta Trappmann and Ivan Bedzhov

September 15, 2017

Interdisciplinary research: The Cells-in-Motion (CiM) Cluster of Excellence at the University of Münster grants ten new interdisciplinary projects that are each lead bytwo CiM team leaders from different disciplines. One of these projects is that of CiM team leaders Dr. Britta Trappmann and Dr. Ivan Bedzov, who both are group leaders at the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Biomedicine.

In their Flexible Funds Project, Dr. Britta Trappmann, a biomedical engineer and biologist Dr. Ivan Bedzhov want to observe for the first time the entire process by which mouse embryos are implanted in the uterine wall. They will develop a synthetic tissue model, on the basis of a new kind of hydrogel. By using this material system the researches can individually influence many of the parameters. The hydrogel, for example, can have exactly the same degree of softness as the tissue of the lining of the uterus. In this way, Britta Trappmann and Ivan Bedzhov can follow the process by which the embryo is implanted in the uterine wall, and how the cells of the embryo interact with the mother´s blood vessels. In 49 percent of all miscarriages, human embryos do not manage to settle successfully in the uterine wall. So the process is often decisive for the success or failure of a pregnancy.

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