It is a fact that is hard to believe for many. Cells of the baby hide inside the body of the mother and keep working for a long time after the birth of the baby. This is a scientific discovery that was made about a century ago by a German scientist. Everyone forgot about this discovery for a long, long time. Now, after more than a century, scientists have once again become interested in these baby cells as they try to find out what these cells do inside the body of the mother.
Findings of these scientists may have bearing on the studies being conducted on women and diseases like cancer and autoimmune diseases. If one believes what scientists are trying to say, it becomes so interesting to note that the body of a woman is home to not just her own cells but also the cells of all the children that she bears. However, this is not the end of this story. You may be a carrier of cells of your siblings older then you. You may have cells of your grandmother, and even your great grandmother.
Fetus leaves behind material inside the body of the mother
Dr. Hilary Gammill says that pregnancy is a phenomenon no less than invasion of a human body by aliens. This is because the fetus that forms inside the womb of a woman has genes different from her. This fetus is like an alien inside the body of the mother. This alien controls the body of the mother through placenta that grows slowly and even exercises control over blood flow. This placenta literally invades the body of the mom and passes on all the nutrients required by the growing baby from the body of the mother. Most people think that it one way traffic with mother providing everything to the baby but this placenta leaves lots of fetal material into the body f the mother. All this foreign material keeps floating inside the body of the mother.
Fetal medicine expert at University of Washington, Dr. J. Lee Nelson says that these materials that include fetus DNA, fetus cells, and even small pieces of the placenta float all over the body and even find their way into some of the organs of the mother. They become liver, heart, and even muscle cells of the woman.
Fetus cells protect mother’s body from several diseases
Scientists, when they first studied these cells residing in the body of the mother, considered them as bad for the health of the mother and even linked them with autoimmune, and several other diseases. But as these studies entered into advanced stages, vies of scientists started to change. They discovered that these fetal cells proved to be beneficial to mom’s body in many different ways.
Scientists found fetus cells in scar tissues that are often created by Caesarian operations. Scientists say that fetus cells help in making collagen to repair the skin and heal up the wounds. These cells also prevent risk of breast cancer and development of rheumatoid arthritis in the joints of mother’s body. Dr. Gamill says that fetus cells work as watchdogs and kill cancer cells as soon as they find them. Similarly, fetus cells increase protect tin against autoimmune diseases.
What surprises scientists is the fact that it is not just placenta that gives cells to the body of the mother. Mother’s body cells also find their way into the placenta. Amy Boddy, who is a research fellow at University of Arizona, says that this is how babies receive cells of their mothers. These cells belong to not just mom but also to older siblings and even mother’s mother and grandmother.
