Epitalon protects against post-ovulatory aging-related damage of mouse oocytes in vitro

Yue X, Liu SL, Guo JN, Meng TG, Zhang XR, Li HX, Song CY, Wang ZB, Schatten H, Sun QY, Guo XP · Aging (Albany NY)

At 0.1 mM, reactive oxygen species fell, fragmentation fell from 13% to 5.8%, fragmentation after parthenogenetic activation fell by about 27%, spindle defects and cortical-granule displacement were partly rescued, mitochondrial membrane potential and mtDNA copy number were higher, and DNA-damage signal and early apoptosis were lower than in untreated aged oocytes. At 1 mM and 2 mM the peptide did not reduce reactive oxygen species.

Population

Ovulated mouse oocytes aged 24 hours in culture as a model of post-ovulatory ageing; more than 30 oocytes per group in at least three replicates

Intervention

Epitalon 0.05 to 2 mM in the culture medium, with 0.1 mM the effective concentration

Comparator

Aged oocytes without the peptide, and fresh oocytes

Limitations

Mouse oocytes in culture. The effective concentration, 0.1 mM, is about 39 µg/ml, three to four orders of magnitude above the nanogram-per-millilitre concentrations the institute's cell work uses, and the two highest concentrations were inactive. Funded by the Shandong Natural Science Foundation; no institute author and no declared conflict.