Stem cell-conditioned medium improves methylation patterns and quality of caprine preantral follicles.

In Brief: Conditioned medium from Wharton's jelly mesenchymal stem cells improved tissue and preantral follicle outcomes, preventing adverse effects of oxidative stress, apoptosis, and epigenetic changes.

Abstract: This study investigated the methylation patterns of H3K4me3 and H3K9me3, as well as the mRNA expression of genes encoding the epigenetic regulators KDM1AX1, KDM1AX2, and KDM3A in goat preantral follicles developed in vivo (Uncultured control) or after in vitro culture for 7 days in either the absence (α-MEM+) or presence of conditioned medium (α-MEM+ + CM) from Wharton's jelly mesenchymal stem cells (WJ-MSCs). In the invivo setting, all follicular categories exhibited similar H3K4me3 and H3K9me3 patterns, and transcripts of KDM1AX1, KDM1AX2, and KDM3A were detected in all samples.

In Vitro Activation and Development of Goat Preantral Follicles Enclosed in Ovarian Tissue Co-cultured with Mesenchymal Stem Cells.

The development of culture systems capable of maintaining follicular growth since the preantral stage has been the target of investigations. Mesenchymal stem cells (MSC) present potential for use in a wide range of applications, including research aimed at preserving fertility. Therefore, this study investigated the use of caprine Wharton's Jelly Mesenchymal Stem Cells (WJMSC) on the survival and in vitro development of goat preantral follicles enclosed in ovarian fragments cultured for 1 or 7 days.

Greater rhea (Rhea americana) external morphology at different stages of embryonic and fetal development.

Knowledge of wild species embryonic development is important for their maintenance in captivity or the wild. The objective of the present study was to characterize the external morphology and define the biometry of greater rhea embryos and fetuses at different stages of development. A total of 41 embryos and fetuses were analyzed to describe their external morphology using a stereoscopic microscope.