Objective Apigenin is a plant-derived compound belong to the flavonoids category and has the protective effects on different cells. The aim was to evaluate the effect of apigenin on the number of viable and apoptotic blastomeres, the zona pellucida (ZP) thickness and the hatching rate of preimplantation mouse embryos exposed to H2O2 and actinomycin D. MaterialsAndMethods 420 two-cell embryos we...

The effect of destruction of some blastomeres on subsequent cleavage in vitro was investigated in the marsupial Antechinus stuartii. Blastomeres were killed by puncturing with a fine glass needle. The positions of the punctured and surviving blastomeres were recorded with respect to the yolk mass and defects on the shell membrane. Blastomeres were punctured in 2-cell, 4-cell, 14-cell, 16-cell a...

The presence of multinuclear blastomeres (MNB) has been widely reported in in-vitro-cultured embryos. Multinucleation at the first mitotic division and affecting both blastomeres is considered abnormal and such embryos are not transferred. The objective of this study was to use fluorescent in-situ hybridization (FISH) and probes specific for chromosomes X, Y and 18 to examine the genetic consti...

Isolated blastomeres obtained by embryo biopsy serve mainly for preimplantation genetic screening. Blastomeres are undifferentiated embryonic cells that include all the embryo genetic information. A lot of developing technologies may benefit by the efficient cryopreservation of blastomeres for future potential use, especially for stem cell culture and differentiation control. We are hereby repo...

We developed several novel tools to genome wide screen for CNVs and SNPs in single cells. When applied to cleavage stage embryos from young fertile couples we discovered, unexpectedly, an extremely high incidence of chromosomal instability, a hallmark of tumorigenesis (Vanneste et al., Nature Medicine, 2009; Vanneste et al., Hum.Reprod., 2011). Not only mosaicisms for whole chromosome aneuploid...

The aim of this study was to estimate how many blastomeres of the 4-cell mouse embryo contribute cells to the embryo proper and finally to the animal. To this end, 4-cell embryos of pigmented and albino genotypes were disaggregated and single blastomeres (henceforth called '1/4' or 'quarter' blastomeres) were reaggregated in the following combinations: one 'pigmented' blastomere + three 'albino...

The amphipod Parhyale hawaiensis is a small crustacean found in intertidal marine habitats worldwide. Over the past decade, Parhyale has emerged as a promising model organism for laboratory studies of development, providing a useful outgroup comparison to the well studied arthropod model organism Drosophila melanogaster. In contrast to the syncytial cleavages of Drosophila, the early cleavages ...

Oct-4, a decisive factor that maintains totipotency in murine embryonic and germ cells, is exclusively expressed in such cells. In mice, different levels of oct-4 expression in blastomeres predict development towards inner cell mass (ICM) (high oct-4) or trophectoderm (TE) (low oct-4). To address whether the mouse model also applies to human embryos, the cytoplasm of individual human blastomere...

The distribution of binding sites for rabbit anti-species antiserum, Concanavalin A (Con A) and peanut agglutinin (PNA) on dissociated blastomeres from 2- to 16-cell mouse embryos has been investigated using direct and indirect fluorescence techniques. With each ligand, paraformaldehyde-fixed blastomeres from 2- to 8-cell precompact embryos were uniformly surface labelled; the majority (77%) o...

Embryogenesis in ascidians is known to be of the mosaic type, a property that suggests the presence of cytoplasmic factors in the egg which are responsible for specification of the developmental fates of early blastomeres. Endoderm cells are present in the trunk region of tadpole larvae, and these cells specifically express alkaline phosphatase (AP). Endoderm cells originate exclusively from bl...