In some cases of infertility in women, human oocytes fail to mature when they reach the metaphase II (MII) stage. Mitochondria plays an important role in oocyte maturation. A large number of mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA), copied in oocytes, is essential for providing adenosine triphosphate (ATP) during oocyte maturation. The purpose of this study was to identify the relationship between transcript ...

The Lidia bovine breed is the most successful cattle breed on the Iberian Peninsula, also considered a hallmark of Spanish tradition and image around the world. The aims of the study were to characterize the oocyte recovery rates and to evaluate the effect of two standard in vitro maturation protocols on oocyte maturation (cumulus expansion and nuclear maturation) and fertilization rates after ...

the development of culture media able to mimic the preovulatory stage of follicular environment and support nuclear and cytoplasmic maturation of oocyte is important for in-vitro fertilization (ivf) programs. it seems that the best culture media for embryonic development and cell cleavage is the natural composition which surrounds the oocyte which has been used occasionally in human ivf program...

background: the following study was carried out to determine the ultrastructural features of the oocyte of the ovulatory-sized follicles in relation to concentrations of steroids and igf-i in the follicular fluid and serum in the dromedary camel. methods: camel follicles with a clear and healthy appearance were categorized into three classes: follicles 10 to 13.9, 14-17.9 and 18-30 mm diameter....

background: the process of wound healing involves integrated events including inflammation, granulation tissue formation, matrix deposition and remodeling. growth factors play a key role in the process. among them transforming growth factor-ß1 (tgf-ß1) is known to accelerate tissue repair by promoting the synthesis and deposition of extracellular matrix proteins. however, persistence or overact...

The developmental competence of oocytes during in vitro maturation (IVM) is compromised due to asynchronous nuclear and cytoplasmic maturation. To improve IVM efficiency, a pre-maturation culture or two-step maturation strategy has been established, involving meiosis arrest induced by pharmacological agents to provide oocytes with sufficient time to synchronize the maturation of the nucleus and...

Thymocytes mature through several stages of development, defined by cell surface markers such as CD3, CD4, and CD8, in response to environmental cues. Signal transduction resulting from lymphocyte-stromal cell interactions is likely to activate inducible transcription factors which in turn govern stage-specific gene expression. In this report we show that inducible transcription factors such as...

The aim of this study was to determine the effect of additional alpha-linolenic acid (ALA) supplementation during in vitro maturation (IVM) and culture (IVC) on nucleic maturation and embryo development of pigs. Cumulus-oocyte complexes (COCs) were incubated in IVM medium containing different concentration of ALA (25, 50 and 100 μM) for 44 h. After in vitro maturation, nuclear maturation of ooc...

Tumors produce a number of immunosuppressive factors that block the maturation of CD34+ stem cells into dendritic cells (DC). We hypothesized that tumors might also interfere with the maturation and/or function of human monocyte-derived DC. In contrast to stem cells, we found that CD14+ cells responded to tumor culture supernatant (TSN) by increasing expression of APC surface markers, up-regula...