Stem cell-like Xenopus Embryonic Explants to Study Early Neural Developmental Features In Vitro and In Vivo

The overall goal of this protocol is to use x laevis blastocoel roof or animal cap explants for testing the molecular mechanisms and cellular processes underlying neural development in vitro and in vivo. These methods can help answer key questions in the developmental and stem cell biology fields about fate acquisition, cell migration, and the cell autonomous and non-autonomous properties of neural cells. The presented techniques provide simple, cheap, versatile, and efficient tools for exploring the fundamental mechanism of key neural cells behaviors.

These assays allow the testing of neural fate determinals for reprogramming induced pluripotent stem cells and the mature generation of neural derived cell ties furtherized screening. Generally, individuals new to this method will struggle as the techniques require manual dexterity. I first had the idea for these methods when I was thinking of analyzing cell segregation behavior.