Over the past decade, significant advances in molecular biological tec
hniques have substantially increased our understanding of in vivo myog
enesis, supplementing the information that previously had been obtaine
d from classical embryological and morphological studies of muscle dev
elopment. In this review, we have attempted to correlate morphogenetic
events in developing murine muscle with the expression of genes encod
ing the MyoD family of myogenic regulatory factors and the contractile
proteins. Differences in the pattern of expression of these genes in
murine myotomal and limb muscle are discussed in the context of muscle
cell lineage and environmental factors. The differences in gene expre
ssion in these two types of muscle suggest that no single coordinated
pattern of gene activation is required during the initial formation of
the muscles of the mouse. (C) 1995 Wiley-Liss, Inc.