Causes of oocyte vitrification and its value in assisted reproductive technology / 南方医科大学学报

OBJECTIVE@#To explore the causes of oocyte vitrification and its application in assisted reproduction.@*METHODS@#We retrospectively analyzed the data of 26 patients with 27 cycles of oocyte vitrification cryopreservation undergoing intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) and embryo transfer between January, 2008 and October, 2018. The causes of oocyte vitrification and the outcomes of ICSI and clinical pregnancy were analyzed.@*RESULTS@#The causes of oocytes vitrification included mainly azoospermia or severe spermatogenesis disorder of the husband, failure to obtain sperms from the husband, failure of the husband to be present on the day of oocyte retrieval and acute diseases of the husband to not allow sperm collection. A total of 274 oocytes were frozen in 27 oocyte retrieval cycles, and 217 eggs were thawed in 19 cycles with a survival rate of 81.11% (176/217). The normal fertilization rate, cleavage rate and high-quality embryo rate was 74.81% (98/131), 89.80% (88/98) and 36.73% (36/98), respectively. Fifteen patients underwent embryo transfer, and the clinical pregnancy rate and live birth rate was 53.33% (8/15) and 33.33% (5/15), respectively. Compared with patients below 35 years of age, the patients aged above 35 years had significantly lower oocyte survival rate after thawing (82.76% 74.42%, =0.211), clinical pregnancy rate (77.78% 16.67%, =0.041) and live birth rate (55.56% 0, =0.044).@*CONCLUSIONS@#Oocytes vitrification can be used as a remedy for infertile couples who fail to provide sperms due to male factors on the day of oocyte retrieval. Vitrification of the oocytes does not significantly affect the fertilization rate or the clinical pregnancy rate. The survival rate of the thawed oocytes is related to the age of the wife, and an age younger than 35 years can be optimal for achieving favorable clinical pregnancy outcomes after oocyte vitrification.

Association of advanced oxidation protein products in seminal plasma with teratospermia and outcome parameters of fertilization / 南方医科大学学报

OBJECTIVE@#To study the association of the level of advanced oxidation protein products (AOPPs) in seminal plasma with teratospermia and the outcome parameters of fertilization (IVF).@*METHODS@#We conducted a cross-sectional study among 272 male patients receiving assisted reproduction treatment in the Center for Reproductive Medicine of our hospital between October, 2018 and March, 2019. The levels of seminal AOPPs and reactive oxygen species (ROS), demographic data, sperm parameters and IVF outcome parameters were analyzed for all the patients. According to the percentage of sperms with normal morphology, the patients were divided before IVF into teratozoospermia group and normal sperm morphology group, and those in teratozoospermia group were further divided into 3 subgroups with mild, moderate and severe teratozoospermia. The patients were also divided on the day oocyte retrieval into 2 groups with fertilizing rates lower (group Ⅰ) and higher (group Ⅱ) than the median rate.@*RESULTS@#We found a significant negative correlation of seminal AOPP level before treatment with the percentage of normal sperm morphology (=0.003) and seminal ROS level (=0.013). The seminal levels of AOPPs (= 0.027) and ROS (=0.036) were significantly elevated in patients with teratospermia, and seminal AOPP level was significantly higher in severe teratospermia group than in mild (=0.019) and moderate (=0.015) teratospermia groups. The seminal levels of AOPPs (=0.003) and ROS (=0.017) on the day of oocyte retrieval were negatively correlated with the fertilization rate in IVF cycles, and the levels of AOPPs (=0.049) and ROS (=0.036) were significantly higher in group Ⅰ than in group Ⅱ.@*CONCLUSIONS@#An elevated level of seminal AOPPs may indicate an increased risk of severe teratospermia and a lower fertilization rate in IVF.

The effect of autophagy regulation on apopstosis of spinal cell in diabetic neuropathic pain rats / 实用医学杂志

Objective To investigate the effect of autophagy regulation on apoptosis of spinal cord cell in diabetic neuropathic pain(DNP)rats.Methods The SD rats were intraperitoneally injected with Streptozotocin to establish DNP model,and were randomly divided into 4 groups:DNP group,DNP-Rapamycin(DNP-R)group, DNP-3-M(DNP-M)group and the control(C)group. Rapamycin or 3-MA was intrathecally injected in rats in DNP-R group and DNP-M group.The protein expression of LC3-II,Bcl-2 and Caspase-3 was detected by Western blot assay,the cell apoptosis was detected by TUNEL assay. Results Compared with DNP group,the expression of LC3-II was significantly up-regulated,while the expression of Caspase-3 and Bcl-2 were significantly down-regu-lated in DNP-R group. For DNP-M group,the expression of LC3-II was significantly down-regulated,while the expression of Caspase-3 and Bcl-2 were significantly up-regulated. The cell apoptosis was significantly reduced in DNP-R group,and significantly increased in DNP-M group. Conclusion There might be a crosstalk between autophagy and apoptosis in spinal cord DNP model. The activation of autophagy might inhibit the apoptosis,while the depression of autophagy might increase the apoptosis of spinal cord cells.

Effect of spermatozoa from different sources on normal fertilization of oocytes and embryo quality and development in intracytoplasmic sperm injection cycles / 南方医科大学学报

<p><b>OBJECTIVE</b>To evaluate the impact of spermatozoa from different sources on normal fertilization of oocytes, embryo quality and embryo developmental potential in intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) cycles.</p><p><b>METHODS</b>A retrospective analysis was conducted among 197 patients undergoing ICSI cycles in our center. The patients were classified into 3 groups according to the sources of semen, namely ejaculated spermatozoa group (n=102), percutaneous epididymal sperm aspiration (PESA) group (n=68), and testicular sperm aspiration (TESA) group (n=27). The ejaculated spermatozoa group was further classified into oligoasthenoteratozoospermia (n=67) and cryptozoospermia (n=35) subgroups. The normal fertilization, high-quality embryo, implantation and clinical pregnancy rates were compared among the groups; the rate of high-quality blastocyst formation in in-vitro culture of non-top quality embryos was also observed.</p><p><b>RESULTS</b>The patients with PESA showed significantly higher normal fertilization rate (75.6%) than those in oligoasthenoteratozoospermia (64.8%), cryptozoospermia (62.1%), and TESA (61.6%) groups (P<0.05). No significant differences were found in the high-quality embryo, implantation, and clinical pregnancy rates among the groups (P>0.05). The rate of high-quality blastocyst formation in the in-vitro culture of non-top quality embryos was also comparable among the groups (P>0.05).</p><p><b>CONCLUSION</b>Although spermatozoa obtained with by PESA is associated with a higher normal fertilization rate, the sources of spermatozoa do not significantly affect the embryonic quality and developmental potential in ICSI cycles.</p>