Naive hPSCs can readily give rise to human trophoblast stem cells, thus demonstrating their extraembryonic lineage potential and providing a new model system to study human trophectoderm specification.

Genetic and epigenetic editing experiments establish causal links between transposon-derived enhancers and gene regulation in mouse embryonic and extraembryonic lineages.

Hundreds of retrovirus-like sequences have features that suggest they might be gene enhancers, but only a small fraction displays gene-regulating activity in experiments on mouse stem cells.

Mice deficient in the TRPM6 channel suffer from impaired prenatal development, shortened lifespan, growth deficit and disturbed energy balance due to a defect in epithelial Mg²⁺ uptake, thus highlighting a pivotal role of TRPM6 in organismal Mg²⁺ homeostasis.

ATR protects stem cell genomes by activating a transcriptional response mediated by totipotency genes, conferring trophoblast differentiation potential, the derepression of which in somatic cells might favour cancer features emergence.

Guidelines governing research into embryos need to be updated in a way that reflects the moral status of synthetic human entities generated using the methods of synthetic biology.

The reconstitution of a functional envelope protein from an extinct hominid retrovirus reveals its receptor and an ancient host defense that may have led to the extinction of the virus.

PCGF6 links sequence specific target recognition by the MAX/MGA transcription factor complex to PRC1 (polycomb repressive complex 1) -dependent transcriptional silencing of germ cell-specific genes in mouse pluripotent stem cells.

Genetic manipulations show that endogenous transcription factors of the SoxB1 class act redundantly to maintain primed pluripotency and reveal differential effects on transitions between pluripotent and differentiation states.

Members of the calcium homeostasis modulator family expressed in the placenta form large channels with unknown activation properties that harbor a lipid bilayer on the inside of a cylindrical pore.