Publisher Summary This chapter provides guidelines for designing explant assays. It gives
suggestions for the isolation and successful culture of explants, and descriptions of the
methods used to assay the final fate of explants after culture. Explant assays involve the
removal of groups of cells from the embryo and their culture in a medium that is believed to
be free from inductive factors. Lineage commitment as defined by explant assays is
sometimes called “specification” to distinguish it from lineage commitment as assessed by …