Forty years of IVF.

This monograph, written by the pioneers of IVF and reproductive medicine, celebrates the history, achievements, and medical advancements made over the last 40 years in this rapidly growing field.

Human embryo research in Belgium: an overview.

Objective: To present an overview of the numbers and types of human embryos used in research projects in Belgium from 2007 to 2015.

Design: Analysis of all research proposals approved by the Federal Commission for Medical and Scientific Research on Embryos In Vitro.

Setting: Not applicable.

Reproductive hormones of ICSI-conceived young adult men: the first results.

Study Question: Are reproductive hormone levels (FSH, LH, inhibin B and testosterone) in male offspring conceived by ICSI because of male infertility comparable with those from peers born after spontaneous conception?

Summary Answer: In this cohort of 54 young men conceived by ICSI because of male-factor infertility, mean and median reproductive hormone levels were found to be comparable with results from spontaneously conceived peers, but ICSI-conceived men were more likely to have low inhibin B (<10th percentile) and high FSH (>90th percentile) levels.

What Is Known Already: Since the worldwide oldest ICSI offspring have recently reached young adulthood, their reproductive health can now be investigated. This typically involves semen analysis and a hormonal profiling including the measurement of FSH, LH, inhibin B and testosterone.

Semen quality of young adult ICSI offspring: the first results.

Study Question: What is the semen quality of young adult men who were conceived 18-22 years ago by ICSI for male infertility?

Summary Answer: In this cohort of 54 young adult ICSI men, median sperm concentration, total sperm count and total motile sperm count were significantly lower than in spontaneously conceived peers.

What Is Known Already: The oldest ICSI offspring cohort worldwide has recently reached adulthood. Hence, their reproductive health can now be investigated.

[Genetics and male infertility].

Infertility is a problem affecting many couples with a child wish. In about half of these couples a male factor is (co-) responsible for the fertility concern. For part of these patients a genetic factor will be the underlying cause of the problems.

CTG repeat instability in a human embryonic stem cell line carrying the myotonic dystrophy type 1 mutation.

Human embryonic stem cells (hESC) are considered to be an indefinite source of self-renewing cells that can differentiate into all types of cells of the human body and could be used in regenerative medicine, drug discovery and as a model for studying early developmental biology. hESC carrying disease-causing mutations hold promise as a tool to investigate mechanisms involved in the pathogenesis of the disease. In this report, we describe the behaviour of an expanded CTG repeat in the 3' untranslated region of the DMPK gene in VUB03_DM1, a hESC line carrying the myotonic dystrophy type 1 (DM1) mutation compared with the normal CTG repeat in two hESC lines VUB01 and VUB04_CF.

Efficient differentiation of human embryonic stem cells into a homogeneous population of osteoprogenitor-like cells.

The use of human embryonic stem cells (hESC) in both research and therapeutic applications requires relatively large homogeneous populations of differentiated cells. The differentiation of three hESC lines into highly homogeneous populations of osteoprogenitor-like (hESC-OPL) cells is reported here. These cells could be expanded in a defined culture system for more than 18 passages, and showed a fibroblast-like morphology and a normal stable karyotype.