Replacing serum in culture medium with albumin and insulin, transferrin and selenium is the key to successful bovine embryo development in individual culture
E. Wydooghe A D E , S. Heras A D , J. Dewulf A , S. Piepers A , E. Van den Abbeel B , P. De Sutter B , L. Vandaele C D and A. Van Soom A D
+ Author Affiliations
- Author Affiliations
A Department of Reproduction, Obstetrics, and Herd Health, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Ghent University, B-9820 Merelbeke, Belgium.
B Department of Reproductive Medicine, University Hospital, Ghent University, B-9000 Ghent, Belgium.
C Institute for Agricultural and Fisheries Research, Animal Sciences Unit, Scheldeweg 68, 9090 Melle Belgium.
D These authors contributed equally to this work.
E Corresponding author. Email: eline.wydooghe@ugent.be
Reproduction, Fertility and Development 26(5) 717-724 https://doi.org/10.1071/RD13043
Submitted: 9 February 2013 Accepted: 24 April 2013 Published: 28 May 2013
Abstract
Individual culture of bovine embryos is usually associated with low blastocyst development. However, during preliminary experiments in our laboratory we observed high blastocyst development after individual embryo culture in a serum-free culture system. We therefore hypothesised that serum has a negative effect on embryos cultured individually whereas embryos in groups can counteract this. First, we determined whether the timing of removal of serum (during maturation or culture) had an influence on individual embryo development. The results clearly showed that removal of serum during embryo culture was the main contributing factor since high blastocyst development was observed after individual culture in synthetic oviductal fluid supplemented with bovine serum albumin (BSA) and insulin, transferrin and selenium (ITS), independent of the maturation medium. Second, we investigated whether an individual factor of the ITS supplement was essential for individual embryo development. We demonstrated that repeatable high blastocyst percentages were due to the synergistic effect of ITS. Finally, we investigated if a group-culture effect can still be observed under serum-free conditions. Group culture generated blastocysts with higher total cell numbers and less apoptosis. These data show that individual culture in serum-free conditions leads to high blastocyst development, but group culture still improves blastocyst quality.
Additional keywords: autocrine factors, blastocyst quality, epidermal growth factor, ITS, in vitro embryo production, semi-defined medium.
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