Manufacturing a Female Gamete: An Oocyte Story

Dear Colleagues,

The continuity of life on earth has been ensured since its apparition more than 3.5 billions years ago: Cells only arise from pre-existing cells. In multicellular organisms, unlike the “perishable body of the individual”, something—the “hereditary substance”—has to be passed from generation to generation (in quotes: Wording of August Weissman, 1892). This is the duty of gametes: Oocytes and sperm. Building a fertilizable female gamete is then one of the founding elements of the sexual reproduction of multicellular organisms. This construction is a lengthy, complex, and highly coordinated saga that begins with an undetermined germ cell and transforms it into an oocyte capable of being fertilized. How germ cells come to be oocytes involves profound cell transformations: The construction of a polarized cell infrastructure, extraordinary cell growth, haploid and recombined genetic equipment, and competence with regard to fertilization, all of which are necessary to support the development of the future embryo. This manufacturing implies many specialized and decision-making processes: Communication and interactions between germ cells and somatic cells, meiotic chromosome pairing and homologous recombination, controlled expression of maternal information, metabolic requirements, complex signaling cascades, highly specialized cell divisions, and specific chromosome segregation, supported by adapted cytoskeleton organization and chromatin remodeling.

This Special Issue of Cells should present a comprehensive overview of the oogenesis process in chronological order, including chapters on diverse model organisms that offer an evolutionary perspective to sexual reproduction as well as others covering medical considerations. Based on the contributions of world-leading experts, this Special Issue will be an essential reference for students, researchers, and physicians in the exciting field of research on this fascinating cell.

Dr. Catherine Jessus
Guest Editor

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 communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.

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-anonymized peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Cells 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 2700 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.