Fetal Cells in Maternal Blood Prospects for Noninvasive Prenatal Diagnosis

Several lines of evidence indicate that foetal cells - lymphocytes, nucleated red cells, trophoblasts - exist in maternal blood during pregnancy. The potential thus exists for recovering foetal cells from maternal blood and then analysing these cells for foetal genetic abnormalities. This volume explores the biology and maternal foetal transfer of the three cell types during pregnancy, the use of flow cytometry and other techniques to enrich the yield of these cells from maternal blood, the application of diagnostic techniques for identifying cytogenetic and other genetic abnormalities, and public health and other issues involved in the implementation of such testing.