Comparative study of embryo culture media containing and without containing glucose as energy substrate.

ABSTRACT

The aim to increase pregnancy rate by in vitro fertilization (IVF-ET) is to improve the embryo culture system, especailly the culture media. Most of the conventional IVF media has been deve-loped from somatic cell culture which contains glucose as the energy substrate. Many recent studies in mammals, including human, reported that glucose was not the preferred nutrient for the zygote and early cleaving embryo, and may stimulate premature glycolysis, which induce the Crabtree effect; thus depressing respiratory rate and energy production. This study was conducted to evaluate the embryo culture outcome that grows in conventional IVF media containing 5 mM of glucose (Medicult media) as compared to the home-made media without glucose (SJ-media). Ten infertile couples were enrolled in the study for eleven treatment cycles. Seventy eight oocytes were retrieved, of which sixty three were fertilized as 2 PN embryo, that were randomly allocated into two culture groups 32 embryos in group I( Medicult media), and 31 embryos in group II (SJ-media). Twenty eight hours after the culture, the embryos in both groups were compared. There was no statistical difference between the embryos of the two culture groups (p>0.05), but there was a trend in which embryos in group I had more 3-4 blastomere than group II (68.8%vs 51.5%); embryos in group II; however; had less fragmentation (67.7% vs 50% for fragmentation< 5%) and were of better quality than group I (51.6% vs 40.6% for embryo grade A, and 32.2% vs 25% for grade B). In conclusion, this study has confirmed that human embryos can grow in media devoid of glucose ; at least; as well as glucose containing media. A larger sample size study ; however ; need to be carried out.