
Week 9 to 10
Growth spurt, nails, and fingerprints
- PCW 10iPost-Conception Week
- Days 63-69
- Gestational Week 12
This week, the unborn child’s fingernails start to grow. Just like an adult’s, the fetus’s nails grow out slowly from the nail bed. The fingernails won’t reach the fingertips until approximately 30 weeks after conception.4 The toenails start growing at 14 weeks after conception and finish growing by 34 weeks after conception.5

By nine weeks after conception, the fetus responds to light touch on the face, palms of the hand and soles of the feet.6 A light touch on the sole of the foot may cause the fetus to bend his knee and curl his toes.7
The first recorded eye movements come from the 10th week after conception. When something touches the upper eyelid, the eyes roll downward and the muscles around the eye ‘squint’.8 Furthermore, if researchers touch the palm of the fetus’s hand at this age, she curls her fingers in towards the object, but not her thumb. The fetus does not include her thumb in grasping an object until about 13 weeks after conception.9