Total cell number as well as differential cell numbers representing the inner cell mass (ICM) and trophectoderm were determined by a differential staining technique for preimplantation pig embryos recovered between 5 and 8 days after the onset of oestrus. Total cell number increased rapidly over this time span and significant effects were found between embryos of the same chronological age from...

The morphology of fertilization events has been related to successful implantation by subjective criteria (pronuclei score, pronuclei symmetry and position). This work first described these events by time-lapse technology and then compared the timings of fertilization events (second polar body extrusion, first and second pronuclei appearance, abuttal and fading) in implanted versus nonimplanted...

A cell-free culture system was designed for human embryo development to the blastocyst stage by testing a range of culture conditions in a series of protocols. The culture system that was evolved has a brief 1 h exposure to spermatozoa and then culture of the pronucleate zygote for 2 days in IVF-50 medium. Two or three embryos were cultured together in 20 microl microdrops of medium under oil. ...

OBJECTIVE Great advances have been made in the field of assisted reproductive technology (ART) since the first in vitro fertilization (IVF) baby was born in Korea. This study was designed to report on the current status of ART therapy in South Korea between January 1 and December 31 of 2010. METHODS A revised survey, originally developed by the International Committee Monitoring Assisted Repr...

background: this study was designed to develop a new co-culture system, assess the effect of luteinizing hormone (lh) using sequential media to promote development and increase the quality of 2-cell murine embryos through the 8-16 cell stage to morula and blastocyst stages. materials and methods: monolayers for co-culture were prepared from ovine oviduct epithelial cells (ooec) in dmem/f12 medi...

Monomeric Plum (Plum), a far-red fluorescent protein with photostability and photopermeability, is potentially suitable for in vivo imaging and detection of fluorescence in body tissues. The aim of this study was to generate transgenic cloned pigs exhibiting systemic expression of Plum using somatic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT) technology. Nuclear donor cells for SCNT were obtained by introduci...

Background Timing of the first zygotic cleavage is an accurate predictor of embryo quality. Embryos that cleaved early (EC) have been shown to exhibit higher developmental viability compared to those that cleaved at a later period (LC). However, the viability of EC embryos in comparison to LC embryos after vitrification is unknown. The present study aims to investigate the post-vitrification de...

INTRODUCTION In the previous paper of this series (McLaren & Michie, 1956) we described an experiment in which fertilized mouse eggs were transferred to the left uterine horn of recipient foster-mothers which were themselves pregnant with eggs of their own. Over the range tested (0-18 eggs), as the number of fertilized eggs transferred to the recipient female was increased, the number of embryo...

The relationship between embryo and corpus luteum was studied in an experiment on Barbari goats which were made unilaterally pregnant by embryo transfer 5 days after oestrus. Two embryos were transferred to each recipient whose luteal stage was coinciding with that of the donor. The site of transfer was either ipsilateral uterine horn (group I) or contralateral uterine horn (group II). The "ips...

background: the mitochondria are an important source of adenosine triphosphate (atp) production in pre-implantation embryo. therefore, the objective of this study was to investigate the effect of vitrification and in vitro culture of mouse embryos on their mitochondrial distribution and atp content. methods: the embryos at 2-pn, 4-cell and blastocyst stages were collected from the oviduct of st...