Question

How the following processes each contribute to animal development: regional specification, cell differentiation, morphogenesis, growth, and developmental time (also known as temporal control). Use citations from peer-reviewed scientific journal articles or the textbook to support your ideas.

Answer 1

The development of an animal is a perfectly coordinated process in time and space. Every embryo undergoes a series of stages wherein cells divide, migrate, and differentiate into the organism's adult form. Each cell performs a specific role in the body, serving as a component of a particular organ system. The process of comitment can be divided into two stages (Slack, 1991). The first stage is labile phase called specification. The fate of a cell or a tissue is said to be specified when is capable of differentiating autonomouslly (i.e, by itself) when place in a petri dish or test tube- that is into an enviorment that is neutral with respecto to the developmental pathway. At the stage of specification, self commitment is still capable of being reversed.  regional differentiation is the process by which different areas are identified in the development of the early embryo. the second stage of commitment is determination. A cell or tissue its set to be determined when it´s capable of differentiating autonomosly even when placed into another region of the embryo.The generation of specialized cell types is called differentiation. Thsis is the last stage of a series of events that commit a particular blastomere to become a particular cell type.

There are three mayor strategies of commitment, and no one embryo uses only one of them. All three strategies are based on mechanisms that apportion certain sets of transcription factors to different cells in the early embryo.

Morphogenesis encompass the developmental processes, including directing cells to move towards specific areas and inducing these cells to mature into fully functional, specialized cells that the body needs to survive. The process of morphogenesis requires the establishment of specific body axes separating regions of the body, an organization related to the symmetry of developing and fully formed organisms.

Pre-natal growth and development is broken down into two stages, embryogenesis and organogenesis. During embryogenesis, the zygote develops into the morula, which becomes the blastula, which becomes the gastrula. The process of organogenesis extends from the neurula stage to birth or hatching. The neurula stage is distinguished by differentiation, which is when unspecialized embryonic cells change into specialized cells that are destined to form specific tissues or organs. Growth and development are continuous, dynamic processes that require integration of numerous physiological functions that fundamentally relie on the precise control, in space and time, of genome expression. Whereas we have a wealth of information about spatial patterning, the mechanisms underlying temporal control remain poorly understood. (Gilbert, 2010).