Mondo Knows Facts
Fine fetal hair called lanugo is shed before birth
A downy coat covers the fetus from about twenty weeks and mostly disappears by term Lanugo is soft unpigmented hair that grows over the fetal body as a temporary covering. It is thought to help trap vernix and regulate heat. Most of it is shed in the final weeks of pregnancy, though some babies are born with patches still visible. It sits in Mondo's human body collection, one of 200 facts that each trace back to the reference below.
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Facts that can change over time are reviewed and updated. If something here looks wrong, Mondo would rather know than be confidently incorrect.
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Tags: fetus, hair, development
Fine fetal hair called lanugo is shed before birth: the short answers
- Where does this come from, and can I check it?
- A downy coat covers the fetus from about twenty weeks and mostly disappears by term. The figure is taken from MedlinePlus, which is linked in full on this page. Every fact on Mondo Knows names its source rather than repeating an unsourced claim.
- Is this really a human body fact?
- Yes. It sits on the Human Body shelf, one of 2,600 sourced facts grouped into space, animals, the human body, history, science and more. Category pages collect every fact in the same field.
- What else can I read about it?
- The links under the fact point to a quiz, game, puzzle or calculator on the same subject, and the shelf below shows related facts. The wording here is original, and quoted phrases are marked as quotations.