Publications by authors named "Irena Barnetova"

Global transcription silencing occurs in the oocyte during its final phase of growth. The particular mechanism of this silencing is not well understood. Here, we investigated the silencing of RNA polymerase II transcription in porcine oocytes.

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Both the sperm and oocyte are terminally differentiated cells, but within a very short post-fertilization period, their genomes are converted into a totipotent zygote. The process of this transformation has been studied in a number of mammals as well as in the pig, for which very inconsistent results have been published. To clarify these inconsistencies, we have used the interspecies intracytoplasmic sperm injection technique for embryo production and subsequent paternal genome remodeling evaluation.

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The supply of human oocytes is very limited. This restricts not only certain assisted reproduction procedures in IVF clinics where recipients wait for oocytes from donors, but also development of some promising approaches, like therapeutic nuclear transfer with subsequent derivation of patient compatible embryonic stem cells. Moreover, in some patients, collected oocytes exhibit certain specific defects, and logically, we can expect that after fertilization, the embryos arising from these defective oocytes may not develop or that their development might eventually be compromised.

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Background: The epigenetic status of human spermatozoa is difficult to analyse. The method of interspecies fertilization can be used for different purposes. The aim of our work was to adopt this approach for the detailed analysis of epigenetic status of human spermatozoa injected into mouse oocytes.

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