The precise timing of embryo splitting for monozygotic dichorionic diamniotic twins: when does embryo splitting for monozygotic dichorionic diamniotic twins occur? Evidence for splitting at the morula/blastocyst stage from studies of in vitro fertilization.

There is a long-held credo, as illustrated in Langman's Medical Embryology (11th ed., Sadler, 2010), that dichorionic diamniotic (DD) twins develop after embryo splitting in the early stages of embryonic development. However, from our clinical experiences of the examination of data from single-embryo transfers in 16 fertility clinics in Japan and from various reports, the majority of occurrences of DD twins have been found in the blastocyst stages.