The heart of an unborn child inside a mother's womb develops and beats as early as 16 days, a recent study from the United Kingdom concluded, supporting the argument of pro-life groups that the embryo is not just a mere "blob of blood."

The research conducted by the Oxford University found out that the heart muscle of mice started to beat seven and a half days after the sperm and egg meet. This is equivalent to 16 days in human embryos, or before the pregnant mother even realises that she missed a period.

These findings are a week earlier than previously thought. Earlier researchers indicated that the heart only starts beating once it has developed into a tube, but the Oxford University study said it already responded to regular "pulses" of calcium at 16 days, when the organ is still crescent-shaped.

"The heart is the first organ to form during pregnancy and is critical to providing oxygen and nutrients to the developing embryo," the University of Oxford stated, as quoted by Life Site News

Professor Paul Riley, the research team spokesman, said the study was primarily aimed at determining how to fight heart ailments among unborn children.

"We are one step closer to being able to prevent heart conditions from arising during pregnancy," Riley explained.

Mary Ellen Douglas of the pro-life group Campaign Life Coalition of Canada meanwhile said the Oxford University study all the more proves that abortion is never justifiable even during the early days of pregnancy.

"Science is catching up with what we always have known, that life begins with union of the sperm and ovum and what is in the womb after that is a human being with its own DNA, and with its own heart pumping its own blood," Douglas told Life Site News.

Carol Tobias of U.S. National Right to Life, for her part, expressed hopes that this new factual evidence will discourage women who plan to kill their unborn children early in the pregnancy, thinking that they are just coagulated blood.

"With this new information, women seeking an abortion early in the pregnancy would be told her baby's heart may already be beating. Hopefully, that would be a tremendous incentive not to go forward with the abortion," Tobias said.