Reproduction Abstracts

Introduction: During female fetal life, mammalian oocytes begin meiosis and arrest in prophase of meiosis I when they become enclosed in primordial follicles. Bivalent chromosomes established during this time have to remain intact until they are resolved during anaphase I, just before ovulation. Bivalents are stabilized throughout this period by Rec8-containing cohesin complexes. In women, however, extending this period for more than 35 years increases the risk of aneuploidy r...

Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) mutations are maternally inherited and are associated with a broad range of debilitating and fatal diseases. Reproductive technologies designed to uncouple the inheritance of mtDNA from nuclear DNA may enable affected women to have a genetically related child with a greatly reduced risk of mtDNA disease. To this end, we have performed preclinical studies on pronuclear transplantation (PNT). Surprisingly, techniques used in proof of concept studies inv...