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The Influence of Insulin on the in vitro Development of Mouse and
Bovine Embryos
J. Mihalik, P. Rehák, J. Koppel
Institute of Animal Physiology, Slovak Academy of Sciences, Košice, Slovak
Republic
Received May 31, 1999
Accepted October 26, 1999
Summary
To further investigate the role of insulin during preimplantation embryo development, we compared the effects of insulin on the
development of mouse and bovine preimplantation embryos and on cell
proliferation during culture in vitro in simplex media. The influence of
insulin on the development of mouse zygotes was determined during cultivation in mSOF medium, alone or supplemented with glucose. Similarly, the effects of
insulin on the bovine preimplantation embryo development were studied in mSOF
medium. The addition of insulin into mSOF medium enhanced significantly the
number of cells per mouse blastocyst. Moreover, when mSOF medium was
supplemented with insulin and 0.2 mmol.l-1 glucose, the percentage of
hatched blastocysts and the mean cell number of mouse blastocysts were
significantly higher. Insulin had no significant effect on the development of
bovine embryos, produced by in vitro fertilization of in vitro
matured oocytes. Neither the rates of developing embryos nor the mean number of
cells in blastocysts were different in comparison with control embryos. Our
results suggest that the in vitro development of mouse embryos could be
enhanced by the addition of insulin to the culture medium and is further
improved by the addition of glucose. In contrast to this our results indicate
that insulin has no detectable beneficial effect on the preimplantation
development of bovine embryos in mSOF medium.
Key words
Preimplantation embryo · Mouse ·
Bovine · Insulin ·
Development
Reprint requests
Dr. J. Koppel, Institute of Animal Physiology, Slovak Academy
of Sciences, Šoltésovej 4-6, 040 01 Košice, Slovak Republic.
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