Precise and scalable self-organization in mammalian pseudo-embryos

Abstract

Gene expression is inherently noisy, posing a challenge to understanding how precise and reproducible patterns of gene expression emerge in mammals. We investigate this phenomenon using gastruloids, an in vitro model for early mammalian development. Our study reveals intrinsic reproducibility in the self-organization of gastruloids, encompassing growth dynamics and gene expression patterns. We observe a remarkable degree of control over gene expression along the main body axis, with pattern boundaries positioned at single-cell precision. Furthermore, as gastruloids grow, both their physical proportions and gene expression patterns scale proportionally with system size. Notably, these properties emerge spontaneously in self-organizing cell aggregates, distinct from many in vivo systems constrained by fixed boundary conditions. Our findings shed light on the intricacies of developmental precision, reproducibility, and size scaling within a mammalian system, suggesting that these phenomena might constitute fundamental features of multicellularity.