genesis

The Greek "genesis" means "origin" and is used as a medical term for the origin of diseases as well as for physiological regeneration processes. In this context, the embryogenesis plays a role, which the genesis of human life.

What is the genesis?

Diseases arise in different ways. For example, while one is an inflammatory cause, the other is a traumatic cause. A pathological phenomenon can just as easily have an immunological cause or a hitherto unexplained cause.

The medical term genesis is used synonymously for the cause or development of a disease. Literally translated, the Greek word "genesis" means something like origin. Etiology deals with the genesis of diseases. This medical specialty must be distinguished from pathogenesis, which, in addition to its development, also deals with the development of diseases in the further course.

The expression of genesis also plays a role in the development of life in the context of evolutionary biology. Biogenesis is, for example, the origin and development of living things. Ontogenesis is the development from the fertilized egg cell to the individual and adult living being and embryogenesis corresponds to the biological process of embryo formation.

In a broader sense, the term genesis is used by medicine for all processes that involve development or allow something new to emerge.

Function & task

Genesis in the evolutionary sense is what helps people to get their shape. Embryogenesis is divided, for example, into the pre-embryonic phase between the first and third week of pregnancy and the embryonic phase between the fourth and eighth week of pregnancy. In the pre-embryonic phase, the zygote develops into a blastocyst. This process is also known as blastogenesis.

After that, three cotyledons form, known as the endoderm, mesoderm and endoderm. The cells have undergone an initial differentiation and are divided into inner, middle and outer layers. The embryonic organ structures are formed in the embryonic phase. In addition to embryonic heart development, embryonic liver development, for example, takes place in this phase.

Embryogenesis encompasses processes such as gastrulation and neurulation. During neurulation, for example, the later nervous system is formed. The zygote thus develops into a human during embryogenesis, as the initially omnipotent cells differentiate into the individual body tissues.

The pre-embryonic and embryonic phases are followed by the developmental step of fetogenesis. This step begins in the ninth week and includes organ development with morphogenesis. Evolutionary biology understands morphogenesis to mean all shaping processes that help living beings to achieve their individual shape. The tissues also differentiate during fetogenesis. This process is also known as histogenesis.

After fetogenesis, the embryo already has a distinctly human shape. The organs take on an independent function piece by piece, which corresponds to their physiologically planned end function. In summary, the individual phases in the development of the zygote into an independent human being are cell development, nidation, embryogenesis and fetogenesis.

The early embryogenesis can be further subdivided into the formation of the primitive streak, the gastrulation, the development of the notochord, the neurulation and the somite development as well as the curvature and the pharyngeal arch development. Embryogenesis ends with morphogenesis and histogenesis in the context of fetogenesis.

Illnesses & ailments

Errors can always occur during complex genesis processes such as embryogenesis. Because of this, there is some risk of malformations during embryogenesis. Errors in embryonic cell differentiation and cell division are triggered either by genetic disposition or by infectious diseases, toxins, drugs, radiation or the like.

Severe malformations caused by embryogenic defects are one of the most common causes of miscarriage during pregnancy. In terms of the cause, the genesis also plays a clinical role for any disease. Many diseases are still unknown today.

A disease of autoimmune origin corresponds to a disease in which the immune system is directed against the own body through incorrect programming, as is the case, for example, with the autoimmune disease multiple sclerosis (MS). Diseases of degenerative origin are characterized by stunted cells, for example Parkinson's. Metabolic genesis describes the causes of disease in the metabolism and is given, for example, for Wilson's disease. In the case of neoplastic genesis, however, the cause of the disease is associated with uncontrolled cell growth. In the case of a traumatic genesis, the primary cause of the clinical picture is again an injury.

In everyday clinical practice, the genesis indicates for each clinical picture what the cause of the individual symptoms can be traced back to. A disease can have different origins at the same time. For example, MS is autoimmune of inflammatory genesis.

The etiology recognizes the genesis of a disease based on three different categories. The first of these is known as the Causa. In this way, in the case of well-researched medical phenomena, causal reasons for the development of the disease can be determined. When a certain cause is given, the disease occurs, so to speak. The second category of etiology is somewhat more uncertain. It is also known as a Contributio. There is still a strong connection between cause and consequence. If there is a certain cause, the disease does not necessarily have to occur, but it is documented to occur more frequently. The third category of aetiology is called correlation. This category is particularly important for diseases without a clearly researched cause-consequence relationship. Correlatio means with regard to genesis that a person with disease A sometimes has trait B. Whether property B is actually causally linked to disease A remains unclear.