صورة:Tubal Pregnancy with embryo.jpg

• If you think this file should be featured on Wikimedia Commons as well, feel free to nominate it.
• If you have an image of similar quality that can be published under a suitable copyright license, be sure to upload it, tag it, and nominate it.

Human Embryo (7th week of pregnancy, 5th weeks p.o.)

This photo of an opened oviduct with an ectopic pregnancy features a spectacularly well preserved 10-millimeter embryo. It is uncommon to see any embryo at all in an ectopic, and for one to be this well preserved (and undisturbed by the prosector's knife) is quite unusual.

Even an embryo this tiny shows very distinct anatomic features, including tail, limb buds, heart (which actually protrudes from the chest), eye cups, cornea/lens, brain, and prominent segmentation into somites. The gestational sac is surrounded by a myriad of chorionic villi resembling elongated party balloons. This embryo is about five weeks old (or seven weeks in the biologically misleading but eminently practical dating system used in obstetrics).

The photo was taken on Kodak Elite 200 slide film, with a Minolta X-370 camera and 100mm f/4 Rokkor bellows lens at near-full extension. The formalin-fixed specimen was immersed in tap-water and pinned to a tray lined with black velvet. The exposure was 1/4 second at f/8.

• http://web2.airmail.net/uthman/specimens/index.html
• http://www.flickr.com/photos/euthman/304334264

Posted 12 Oct 01

Photograph by Ed Uthman, MD.

PD Public domain.

In case this is not legally possible:
Euthman grants anyone the right to use this work for any purpose, without any conditions, unless such conditions are required by law.