Novel Synthetic oviductal fluid for Conventional Freezing 1 (SCF1) culture medium improves development and cryotolerance of in vitro produced Holstein embryos.

In vitro produced (IVP) embryos hold great promise in the cattle industry; however, suboptimal in vitro culture conditions induce metabolic dysfunction, resulting in poor development and low cryotolerance of IVP embryos. This limits the use of IVP embryos in the cattle industry for embryo transfer and commercial scale-up. Previous studies have reported the use of individual metabolic regulators in culture media to improve blastocyst development rates and cryopreservation.

Pregnancy obtained in a late gestational mare by in vitro embryo production.

Recently, the demand for invitro embryo production in the horse has increased worldwide. Most clinical transvaginal ultrasound-guided ovum pick-up (OPU) procedures are performed in non-pregnant donor mares, and few experimental studies have described invitro embryo production from oocytes of pregnant donors 21-150 days in gestation. This report discusses OPU, follicular growth and invitro embryo production in a pregnant mare during late gestation.

Presumed monozygotic twins develop following transfer of an in vitro-produced equine embryo.

An equine embryo produced by intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) was trans-cervically transferred to a recipient mare and pregnancy was confirmed via ultrasound examination on days 11, 12 and 15. On days 20 and 22, a single embryonic proper with a heartbeat was observed. On day 29, two embryos proper appeared during ultrasound examination, each possessing a heartbeat.