--- title: Capturing the complete process of embryonic development description: MIT researchers built a detailed lineage map of over a million cells as a mouse embryo develops, tracking how cells divide and become tissues and organs. The... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/capturing-the-complete-process-of-embryonic-development-debzhcl6h twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: Capturing the complete process of embryonic development | daily.dev og:description: MIT researchers built a detailed lineage map of over a million cells as a mouse embryo develops, tracking how cells divide and become tissues and organs. The... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/capturing-the-complete-process-of-embryonic-development-debzhcl6h og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/DeBzhcL6H.png og:image:alt: Capturing the complete process of embryonic development og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Capturing the complete process of embryonic development **[MIT News](https://daily.dev/sources/mit)** · 6 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary MIT researchers built a detailed lineage map of over a million cells as a mouse embryo develops, tracking how cells divide and become tissues and organs. The study, from Jonathan Weissman's lab, used a technology called PEtracer, which makes small heritable DNA changes that act like a flight recorder to reconstruct cell family trees. It was published October 8 in the journal Cell. A related study from Jay Shendure's group at the University of Washington, using an approach called DNA Typewriter, was published concurrently in Science. The researchers say the map could help pinpoint where birth defects arise and trace when cells acquire traits in cancer, and could inform stem cell research. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Questions this post answers ### What is PEtracer and how does it work for tracking cell lineage in embryos? PEtracer is a lineage-tracing technology developed in the Weissman Lab at MIT that acts like a flight recorder inside a cell. It makes small, heritable changes to DNA that are passed down as cells divide. By reading those changes later, researchers can reconstruct which cells descended from which ancestors, building a family tree for cells in a developing embryo. _daily.dev surfaces research like this for engineers building bioinformatics or genomics data pipelines._ ### How many cells did the Weissman lab study analyze in their mouse embryo lineage mapping research? The researchers analyzed over a million cells from mouse embryos collected at multiple points during development. Combining cell family trees with gene expression data and spatial location let them follow not just where cells ended up, but when they began heading toward particular fates, published October 8 in the journal Cell. _Follow large-scale biological dataset research like this on daily.dev to stay current on computational biology methods._ ### What is the difference between PEtracer and DNA Typewriter for tracking cell divisions in mouse embryos? PEtracer, from the Weissman Lab, and DNA Typewriter, from Jay Shendure's group at the University of Washington, are both lineage-tracing approaches published concurrently (PEtracer in Cell, DNA Typewriter in Science). The Weissman team studied embryos at closely spaced developmental stages with multiple embryos per stage, giving a more detailed picture of how consistently cells follow the same developmental paths across embryos. _Developers comparing competing scientific methods can track both approaches side by side on daily.dev._ ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [Deep-learning model predicts how fruit flies form, cell by cell](https://daily.dev/posts/deep-learning-model-predicts-how-fruit-flies-form-cell-by-cell-fhntelpcm) · MIT News · 90 upvotes · 7 comments - [New method allows scientists to follow gene activity over time in the same cells](https://daily.dev/posts/new-method-allows-scientists-to-follow-gene-activity-over-time-in-the-same-cells-xjqf9yjw1) · MIT News · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [Meet a mouse whose brain cortex is made up of human cells](https://daily.dev/posts/meet-a-mouse-whose-brain-cortex-is-made-up-of-human-cells-qxnx7jazi) · MIT Technology Review · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [AI model decodes the language cells use to communicate](https://daily.dev/posts/ai-model-decodes-the-language-cells-use-to-communicate-uf6txchpc) · MIT News · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [Best-Ever Brainstem Map Created By Indian Scientists](https://daily.dev/posts/best-ever-brainstem-map-created-by-indian-scientists-tesal8k7m) · Hackaday · 0 upvotes · 0 comments --- [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/capturing-the-complete-process-of-embryonic-development-debzhcl6h) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"Capturing the complete process of embryonic development","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/capturing-the-complete-process-of-embryonic-development-debzhcl6h","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/capturing-the-complete-process-of-embryonic-development-debzhcl6h"},"datePublished":"2026-10-28T20:42:45.994Z","dateModified":"2026-10-28T21:36:35.914Z","description":"MIT researchers built a detailed lineage map of over a million cells as a mouse embryo develops, tracking how cells divide and become tissues and organs. 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It makes small, heritable changes to DNA that are passed down as cells divide. By reading those changes later, researchers can reconstruct which cells descended from which ancestors, building a family tree for cells in a developing embryo. daily.dev surfaces research like this for engineers building bioinformatics or genomics data pipelines."}},{"@type":"Question","name":"How many cells did the Weissman lab study analyze in their mouse embryo lineage mapping research?","acceptedAnswer":{"@type":"Answer","text":"The researchers analyzed over a million cells from mouse embryos collected at multiple points during development. Combining cell family trees with gene expression data and spatial location let them follow not just where cells ended up, but when they began heading toward particular fates, published October 8 in the journal Cell. 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