Ever Seen Fetuses Yawning In Womb? Must Watch Video!

With the aid of modern technology, we were able to conclude that unborn babies are able to swallow, stretch, as well as get a hiccup in the womb. But, new ultrasound research shows that unborn babies are able to perform yet another action while nestled in your womb: yawn.

Researchers at Lancaster University and Durham University made use of 4-D full-frontal ultrasound face profiling of 15 fetuses. This helped them conclude that yawning is a developmental process and could open new doors for clinicians to judge a fetus’ health using an index that depends on the capability and frequency of an unborn’s yawning.

This claim has caused quite the controversy among researchers where one-half claim that fetuses are able to yawn whereas other researchers claim that the ultrasound pictures do not provide conclusive evidence. This is because it could have merely captured the picture of the fetus with its mouth open in an attempt to swallow amniotic fluid. Touché.

However, the latest research clearly differentiates between infants that were ‘yawning’ in the womb as compared to those who simply had their ‘mouths open in a non-yawn manner’. This research was performed with the aid of 4-D video footage that captured the motion of unborn babies in utero. Researchers made a note of every occurrence of when a fetus stretched its mouth and was able to clearly identify the moment when a fetus was ‘yawning’.

This study was carried out on seven male fetuses and eight female fetuses. The data gathered by researchers concluded that more than 50% of mouth openings seen, with the help of 4-D video capturing, were classified as ‘yawns’. The study was conducted on fetuses from 24-36 weeks gestation. The researchers discovered that the frequency of yawning in unborn infants decreased from 28 weeks and that there was no correlation between frequency of yawning and the gender of the fetus.

The video above was captured with the help of cutting edge, state of the art, 4-D Video Capture that is able to display real-time video footage of a baby while in utero. The fetus in the video, clearly opens its mouth with the intention to yawn before closing it and puckering its lips.

Now though the exact reason as to why unborn children perform yawning when in utero is still unclear, the information obtained from this research suggests that yawning could have a direct link to fetal development. If this truly is the case, scientists will be able to judge fetal health in a whole new way by studying the frequency and duration of unborn babies yawning.

The lead researcher, at Durham University’s department of psychology, Dr. Nadja Reissland stated that “The results of this study demonstrate that yawning can be observed in healthy fetuses and extends previous work on fetal yawning. Our longitudinal study shows that yawning declines with increasing fetal age. Unlike us, fetuses do not yawn contagiously, nor do they yawn because they are sleepy. Instead, the frequency of yawning in the womb may be linked to the maturing of the brain early in gestation. Given that the frequency of yawning in our sample of healthy fetuses declined from 28 weeks to 36 weeks gestation, it seems to suggest that yawning and simple mouth opening have this maturational function early in gestation”.

This research has helped scientist understand the time period in a fetus’ nine-month growth period where it requires the most amount of nutrition to develop major organs in order to prepare for life outside.

With the help of modern science and the latest technology, we seem to be making breakthroughs in discovering more about our bodies each day. It is only a matter of time till we can biologically engineer our children to be born free of any health issues. Got to love science, right?

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