Human Fetus Skeletal Joint

Humans and other mammals incorporate joints in their skeletal structure, which allow both complex movement and a degree of flexibility that helps avoid bone breakage. Joints, which may or may not be cartilaginous, develop from mesoderm of the embryo, or in the case of the human fetus, after the ossification of the bones of the fetus. The non-condensed, undifferentiated portions of mesoderm between the bones may develop by one of three mechanisms.