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Animals
Special Issues
Mechanisms of Mammalian Oocyte Quality Control, Molecular Regulation and Solutions
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Mechanisms of Mammalian Oocyte Quality Control, Molecular Regulation and Solutions

A special issue of Animals (ISSN 2076-2615). This special issue belongs to the section "Animal Reproduction".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 July 2023) | Viewed by 2824

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Yilong Miao

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
School of Animal Science and Technology, Nanjing Agricultural University, Nanjing, China
Interests: oocyte maturation; oocyte quality control; potential solutions for reduced oocyte quality; infertility
Dr. Mianqun Zhang

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
School of Animal Science and Technology, Anhui Agricultural University, Anhui, China
Interests: oocyte; meiosis; oocyte maturation; meiotic maturation; female fertility
Dr. Yajuan Lu

E-Mail
Guest Editor
Institute of Reproductive Medicine, Medical School, Nantong University, Nantong, China
Interests: oocyte meiosis maturation; cell cycle control of oocytes

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

High-quality oocytes, a prerequisite for successful fertilization and subsequent embryonic development, are the material basis for the onset of life. Oocyte meiosis involves two unique features compared with somatic cells: homologous chromosome segregation and asymmetric cell division. The molecular regulation of oocyte maturation still requires further exploration.

Recently, the effects of environmental factors, diseases and food safety on oocyte quality and maternal control have been a subject of increasing interest. Environmental exposures to chemical pollutants found in environments including the air, soil, water and biota, diseases such as obesity and diabetes and contaminated foods intake, including the ingestion of mycotoxins, can affect all oocyte maturation quality and reduce fertilization and early embryo development competence. These exposures could disrupt meiosis resumption, cell cycle progression, meiotic spindle organization, chromosome segregation, actin dynamics, organelle function and polar body extrusion. These exposed oocytes show mitochondria dysfunction, DNA damage, oxidative stress, apoptosis/autophagy and a reduced fertilization rate, indicating that the oocyte quality is affected. Although several solutions, such as the use of melatonin and Resveratrol, are proposed to protect the oocytes from toxic exposure through their effects on oxidative stress via antioxidant functions, studies uncovering effective solutions and applications are still needed.

This Special Issue aims to focus on the effects of molecular regulation and toxic exposure on mammalian oocyte maturation. The expanding body of knowledge on the molecular mechanisms underlying oocyte quality control will provide exciting new insights into oocyte maturation and early development.

We look forward to receiving your contributions.

Dr. Yilong Miao
Dr. Mianqun Zhang
Dr. Yajuan Lu
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Animals is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • oocyte meiotic maturation
  • oocyte quality control
  • aging cell cycle control of oocytes
  • organelle function of oocytes
  • potential solutions for reduced oocyte quality

Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

14 pages, 3261 KiB  
Article
Progesterone and Androstenedione Are Important Follicular Fluid Factors Regulating Porcine Oocyte Maturation Quality
by Huaxing Zhao, Xiaohua He, Xianjun Zhang, Junsong Shi, Rong Zhou, Ranbiao Mai, Qiaoyun Su, Gengyuan Cai, Sixiu Huang, Zheng Xu, Zhenfang Wu and Zicong Li
Animals 2023, 13(11), 1811; https://doi.org/10.3390/ani13111811 - 30 May 2023
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1065
Abstract
Oocytes matured in vitro are useful for assisted human and farm animal reproduction. However, the quality of in vitro matured oocytes is usually lower than that of in vivo matured oocytes, possibly due to the absence of some important signal regulators in vitro. [...] Read more.
Oocytes matured in vitro are useful for assisted human and farm animal reproduction. However, the quality of in vitro matured oocytes is usually lower than that of in vivo matured oocytes, possibly due to the absence of some important signal regulators in vitro. In this study, untargeted metabolomics was used to detect the changes in the metabolites in the follicular fluid (FF) during in vivo pig oocyte maturation and in the culture medium during in vitro maturation. Our results showed that the total metabolite changing profile of the in vivo FF was different from that of the in vitro maturation medium, but the levels of 23 differentially expressed metabolites (DEMs) changed by following the same trend during both in vivo and in vitro pig oocyte maturation. These 23 metabolites may be important regulators of porcine oocyte maturation. We found that progesterone and androstenedione, two factors in the ovarian steroidogenesis pathway enriched from the DEMs, were upregulated in the FF during in vivo pig oocyte maturation. The levels of these two factors were 31 and 20 fold, respectively, and they were higher in the FF than in the culture medium at the oocyte mature stage. The supplementation of progesterone and androstenedione during in vitro maturation significantly improved the pig oocyte maturation rate and subsequent embryo developmental competence. Our finding suggests that a metabolic abnormality during in vitro pig oocyte maturation affects the quality of the matured oocytes. This study identified some important metabolites that regulate oocyte maturation and their developmental potential, which will be helpful to improve assisted animal and human reproduction. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Mechanisms of Mammalian Oocyte Quality Control, Molecular Regulation and Solutions)
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13 pages, 3383 KiB  
Article
The Impact of Arp2/3 Complex Inhibition on Cytoskeleton Dynamics and Mitochondrial Function during Goat Oocyte Meiosis
by Meng-Hao Pan, Rui Xu, Yiqian Zhang, Lu Yin, Ruoyu Li, Dongxu Wen, Sihai Lu, Yan Gao, Xiaoe Zhao, Qiang Wei, Bin Han and Baohua Ma
Animals 2023, 13(2), 263; https://doi.org/10.3390/ani13020263 - 12 Jan 2023
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1423
Abstract
F-actin is of critical importance in oocyte meiotic maturation. Actin assembly and its dynamics are mainly regulated by actin nucleation factors. The actin-related protein complex 2/3 (Arp2/3) is responsible for the organization of F-actin filaments. However, the role of Arp2/3 complex in goat [...] Read more.
F-actin is of critical importance in oocyte meiotic maturation. Actin assembly and its dynamics are mainly regulated by actin nucleation factors. The actin-related protein complex 2/3 (Arp2/3) is responsible for the organization of F-actin filaments. However, the role of Arp2/3 complex in goat oocytes has not been fully elucidated. Our findings demonstrate that Arp2/3 complex activity is necessary for the maturation of goat oocytes. The Arp2/3 complex-specific inhibitor CK666 impairs the maturation of goat oocytes and alters the genes associated with cumulus expansion, both of which suggest that normal meiosis is affected. Arp2, one of the subunits of the Arp2/3 complex, was found to be mainly accumulated at the oocyte cortex and to co-localize with F-actin during goat oocyte maturation in our results. Thus, we further investigated the cytoskeleton dynamics and found that Arp2/3 complex inhibition disrupts the F-actin assembly and spindle organization. Further analysis revealed that, in addition to direct effects on the cytoskeleton, Arp2/3 complex could also induce ROS accumulation and oxidative stress by disrupting mitochondrial distribution and function, ultimately increasing the rate of early apoptosis in goat oocytes. Our study provides evidence that the Arp2/3 complex is a key regulator of goat oocyte maturation through its regulation of the cytoskeleton dynamics and mitochondrial function. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Mechanisms of Mammalian Oocyte Quality Control, Molecular Regulation and Solutions)
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