Episode Details

 Many pregnancy complications cluster around issues with the placenta, the first fetal organ to form in a pregnancy. Here at the end of 2025, this organ still holds a significant amount of mystery. It's a wily organ that comes in many different forms across the animal kingdom. Even looking at how other mammals have handled the job of nutrient delivery, gas exchange, and waste removal during pregnancy, suggests a diversity of ways these jobs can be managed, emphasizing different benefits and costs in a pregnancy.

Looking at how these benefits and costs show up in a cellular conversation between the placenta and the cells of the maternal uterine lining across a select group of mammals, including humans is a new way to understand this organ.