Ch. 6

Ch. 6 to me really opened my eyes about how we as humans develop as embryos. At first, i just thought if all went well we'd implant on the uterine wall of our mothers as a blob of cells then multiple into who we were as babies. But from Ch. 6, it showed me how complexer the process is. that after implantation, we as a blob of cells will soon flatten and turn into a complex three layer tube responsible for the whole structure of us as fetuses/embryos and ultimately, how we'll turn out as adults.
The study of both Spemann and Mangold amazed me. By removing just one microscopic section of an embryo, the tissue containing the organizer gene, you have the ability to create another developing embryo, a twin as Shubin said. It just shows how powerful our bodies are, being able to create an entire developing embryo with a tissue containing only but a small handful of genes inside it. Also, i found the discovery of the hox genes interesting as well. These genes are present in every organism with a body and are specifically arranged so we have the head to anus axis when we develop. This helps reinforce the theme that humans are related to almost every creature in this world with only modifications of their genes.
And lastly, the creature were related to in this chapter is... the sea anemone. Who knew that such a simple organism can be related to us in terms of the head to anus axis structure. The reason we're structure the way we are is because of these sea anemone with only a more modified structure. I'm excited to see how were going to be related, as shubin said, to the even simpler being, the microbe.