Clinical Correlation to Pharyngeal Development

To form the pharynx, C. elegans face numerous developmental challenges that are similar to those of more complex animals. Through conserved molecular pathways C. elegans robustly meet those challenges. With the ability to visualize individual cells during organogenesis and the development of powerful tools (genomics, forward and reverse genetics, molecular biology), scientists have begun to discover the genes required for cell fate specification and morphogenesis.

Unfortunately, C. elegans lack the level of sophistication to employ multiple valves and as they do not have a true heart it is difficult to correlate the pharynx development to manifestations of CHD’s.