Reproduction Abstracts

Introduction: Poor maternal diet during development induces physiological, metabolic and anatomical alterations in offspring. These may increase immediate survival chances, but can enhance the risk of disease in later life. Maternal low protein diet (LPD) exclusively in pre-implantation development induces changes in endocytosis, postnatal hypertension, cardiovascular dysfunction and alters behaviour in our mouse model. We have previously shown changes in the embryonic stem ce...

Introduction: The developmental origins of health and disease (DOHaD) concept proposes that maternal environment during pregnancy may influence offspring health and predispose to chronic disease risk in later life. Our previous mouse in vivo studies showed that maternal low protein diet (LPD) and advanced maternal age (AMA) programme the preimplantation embryo to adult disease, notably cardiometabolic dysfunction. To test this hypothesis and understand the mechanistic...

Introduction: The pre-implantation embryo has two distinct cell lineages at the blastocyst stage. An outer epithelial monolayer called trophectoderm and the non-polar inner cell mass. Tight junctions (TJ) form continuous intercellular contacts between neighbouring trophectoderm cells and are crucial in establishing a blastocoele cavity. TJs are composed of several transmembrane proteins including Claudins, a large family of proteins that play a central role in the formation of...

Short-term effects of cryopreservation on embryo development, survival and after embryo transfer (ET), resulting pregnancy rate have been documented. However, long-term effects on offspring remain relatively unexplored.Materials and methods: Using a mouse model, we investigated the effect of vitrification on blastocyst trophectoderm (TE) and inner cell mass (ICM) cell numbers by differential staining and postnatal growth and cardiovascular and metabolic ...

Introduction: Maternal depletion of insulin in serum and branched-chain amino acids (BCAA) in uterine luminal fluid occurs in response to dietary protein undernutrition during the periconceptional period which leads to adverse offspring growth and cardiovascular phenotype (e.g. high blood pressure). This study aimed to determine whether insulin and/or BCAA depletion might be inductive in vivo factors for postnatal phenotype using an in vitro embryo culture mo...

Introduction: Maternal low protein diet exclusively during preimplantation mouse development (Emb-LPD) induces compensatory changes in extra-embryonic lineages including primitive endoderm (PE) to enhance nutrient delivery during later gestation, for example, stimulation of endocytosis. Whilst such responses protect fetal growth, adult offspring exhibit increased cardiometabolic disease risk. Here, we investigate epigenetic mechanisms underlying maternal dietary programming, u...

The embryonic environment can induce permanent changes in metabolism and increase disease risk in adults. Rodent models show that modifications in maternal diet exclusively during pre-implantation development can induce metabolic disease in adults. Changes must therefore occur within the early embryo and be maintained throughout development. Determining adaptive mechanisms is challenging due to the size of the early embryo. We generated ES cells from inbred C57BL/6 mice as a m...

Several million babies have been born worldwide since IVF and assisted-reproductive technologies (ART) became available. However, reports link IVF techniques with adverse short- and long-term health outcomes.1,2,3 Using a mouse model, we investigated the effect of IVF on the total cell number in blastocyst stage embryos and the postnatal health of offspring.Methods: Experimental groups; (NM) C57/BL6 non-superovulated females naturally mated wi...

Maternal malnutrition during pregnancy is detrimental to fetal development and increases the risk of many chronic diseases in later life i.e. neurological consequences such as increased risk of schizophrenia. Previous studies have shown maternal protein malnutrition during pregnancy and lactation compromises brain development in late gestation and after birth, affecting structural, biochemical, and pathway dynamics with lasting consequences for motor and cognitive function. Ho...

Introduction: Women with mutations in BRCA1 gene have an increased lifetime risk of ovarian cancer. Many studies but not all have shown that an adequate folate intake is protective against many cancers including ovarian, but recent studies have shown that high levels of folic acid (FA) supplementation can promote cancer risk. The aim of this study is to determine FA impact on the expression of cancer related genes in the ovary such as OCT4 a pluripotency factor, BRCA1 related ...