A central question in the field of Developmental Biology is: How does a single-celled embryo give rise to a
complex multicellular organism? Our understanding of embryogenesis rests on the construction of fate maps
which allow us to study the future identity of cells within an organism. By labeling and tracking cells at various
stages of embryonic development we can observe which tissues or organs they will become part of at a later
stage of development. Building a comprehensive fate map thus provides valuable insights into an organism’s
developmental pathway. However, the experimental procedure to construct fate maps is tedious, time-
consuming, and technically challenging, making it difficult to incorporate it as a lab for undergraduate students.
In this mini-workshop, I will present a lab activity which I developed using a free user-friendly app called
FatemapApp (http://fatemapapp.com/) to give students a flavor of how fate-maps are generated and what we
can learn from them. This exercise focused on embryos from the following species: the 32-cell stage of the
African clawed frog Xenopus laevis, the gastrula stage of the zebrafish embryo, and the 76-cell stage of the
tunicate embryo, Holocynthia roretzi. Students utilized the FatemapApp to construct fate maps for these
organisms, and subsequently presented their findings. This highly engaging and interesting lab activity was
originally developed by us for online learning in 2020, and later incorporated as part of our regular in-person
course.
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