Problems with the placenta may also contribute to another feature of cloned mammals: They're huge.
No word on whether the placenta plans to sue for invasion of its privacy.
In some cultures, families bury the placenta in a special place, such as their backyards.
Some women also cook and eat the placenta, a practice known as human placentophagy.
These include abruption, where the placenta separates from the uterus wall, and the potentially life-threatening condition pre-eclampsia.
The mother's abdomen and uterus are opened so as not to harm the placenta, which nourishes the fetus.
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If you have questions about the placenta or placental problems during pregnancy, talk to your health care provider.
HCG, human chorionic gonadotropin, is a hormone produced by the placenta during pregnancy.
He suspects that the fetus may develop normally but the placenta does not, so the fetus is essentially starving.
The symptoms of pre-eclampsia have been linked to the production of toxic molecules called free radicals by the placenta.
If "placentophagia" - the practice of eating the placenta - remains a minority activity, there have been other applications.
If you have a C-section, your health care provider will remove the placenta from your uterus during the procedure.
Your health care provider might massage your lower abdomen to encourage your uterus to contract and expel the placenta.
Your health care provider will examine the placenta to make sure it's intact.
Stemnion, a small biotech firm in Pittsburgh, is working on using stem cells found in the placenta for healing wounds.
Professor Smith said that it was likely that the teenagers were unable to supply their babies with sufficient nutrients via the placenta.
Problems range from failure of the embryo to implant in the womb, leading to miscarriage, to rupture of the placenta and pre-eclampsia.
The cause of pre-eclampsia is unknown, but it is clear that the placenta fails to invade into the wall of the mother's uterus.
Worse, once absorbed, the chemical is locked into the body's fat tissue (it is only excreted through the placenta and in breast milk).
The practical benefits of this scanning system could prevent, or at least lessen brain deficits caused by lack of nutrients from the placenta.
Critically, it neglected to check whether thalidomide affected pregnant women, assuming that its molecules could not cross the placenta from mother to child.
An inner clump of cells in the blastocyst goes on to form the embryo, while an outer layer goes on to make the placenta.
"One would think that since the virus doesn't cross the placenta, probably not too much of a threat that we know of, " he said.
Although the father's genetic material is present in the embryo and on the surface of the placenta, the mother's body does not reject it.
He or she can help you better understand the placenta's role.
Pregnancy websites have some handy hints for mothers-to-be about how they could use their placenta in making prints, using the placenta to make patterns on paper.
Clones "may be up to four times bigger than normal animals and the placenta might be up to seven times bigger than in normal animals, " Jaenisch said.
Organophosphates, which pass from the mother to fetus through the placenta and umbilical cord, may be more damaging to developing fetuses than to children, the study notes.
Caffeine is dangerous during pregnancy, Li said, because it can cross through the placenta to the fetus and can be difficult for the fetus to metabolize the caffeine.
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