• Journal of Embryo Transfer
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.121-128
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• 2000

This study was conducted to enhance the efficiency of embryo transfer and embryos produced in vitro according to select good quality blastocyst among in vivo or in vitro produced embryos. After middle blastocys(MB) and late blastocyst(LB) stages embryos that developed in vitro for 7∼8 days were treated hypertonic solution(380 mOsm or 600 mOsm) and the rate of development to hatched blastocyst(HB) was examined. The results obtained were summarized as follows: The proportion of embryos developed to HB was higher than that of control regardless of hypertonic solution treatment. However, it was related to culture time in hypertonic solution The propotrion of embryos developed to HB of morphologically recovered embryos in 380 nOsm solution ws higher than that of morphologically shrinked embryos. However, treatment time was not significantly different the rates of HB development. Especially, the proportion of embryos developed to HB of morphologically recovered embryos of the 30-min-treated group was significantly higher than that of control (p<0.05). The results suggest that hypertonic solution treatment should enhance the efficiency for criterion of transferable blastocyst quality.

• Biomedical Science Letters
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.8-16
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• 2017

p-Coumaric acid is an organic compound that is a hydroxyl derivative of cinnamic acid. Due to its multiple biological activities p-coumaric acid has been widely studied in biochemical and cellular systems and is also considered as a useful therapeutic candidate for various neuronal diseases. However, the efficacy of p-coumaric acid on zebrafish developmental regulation has not been fully explored. In this study, therefore, we first investigated the action mechanism of the p-coumaric acid on the zebrafish development in a whole-organism model. p-Coumaric acid treated group significantly inhibited the pigmentation of the developing zebrafish embryos compared with control embryos without any severe side effects. In addition, p-coumaric acid down-regulated more effectively in a lower concentration than the well-known zebrafish's melanogenic inhibitor, phenylthiourea. We also compared the molecular docking property of p-coumaric acid with phenylthiourea on the tyrosinase's kojic acid binding site, which is the key enzyme of zebrafish embryo pigmentation. Interestingly, p-coumaric acid interacted with higher numbers of the amino acid residues and exhibited a tight binding affinity to the enzyme than phenylthiourea. Taken all together, these results strongly suggest that p-coumaric acid inhibits the activity of tyrosinase, consequently down-regulating zebrafish embryo pigmentation, and might play an important role in the reduction of dermal pigmentation. Thus, p-coumaric acid can be an effective and non-toxic ingredient for anti-melanogenesis functional materials.

• Korean Journal of Plant Tissue Culture
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• v.26 no.3
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• pp.149-156
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• 1999

In order to investigate the effect of low temperature pretreatment on pollen dimorphism and embryo formation in anther culture of Platycodon grandiflorum, the anthers with microspore at the uninucleate stage were cultured on Murashige and Skoog medium supplemented with 0.5mg/L NAA and 1.0 mg/L BA. The low temperature pretreatment have clear effect on the frequencies of S pollen grains, symmetrical binucleate microspores (B type of S pollen), multinucleate and multicelled pollen grains. Especially, after low temperature pretreatment at 8$^{\circ}C$ for 5 days increased the frequency of S pollen grain (20.6%) in vivo. In addition, the highest frequency of callus induction (54.9%) and embryo formation (9.9%) were obtained from the anther pretreatment at 8$^{\circ}C$ or 5 days. Three distinct pathways could be recognized in the androgenesis, one involving mainly the vegetative cell, the second starting with the vegetative and the generative cell, respectively, and the third accompaning with two equal vegetative type cells in the pollen grains.

• Journal of Embryo Transfer
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• v.20 no.1
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• pp.63-69
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• 2005

This study were carried out to evaluate the possibility of nuclear progression of canine immature oocytes, of which was cultured in a reproductive tract, such as oviduct, ovarian bursa and uterus of estrus bitch for 4, 5 and 6 days following immediately collection. Cumulus intact oocytes(COC) fore collected from domestic dog following ovariohysterectomy at local veterinary clinics. In Exp. 1, COCs $of>110\;{\mu}m$ diameter were selected and cultured in vitro at $39^{\circ}C$, $5\%\;CO\_{2} $ in air atmosphere. The nuclear progression of canine oocytes checked at 24, 48 or 72 h after in vitro maturation. There was not increased the nuclear progression to the M II stage depending on culture periods at 24, 48 and 72h $(1.3\%,\;3.7\%\;and\;4.7\%)$. In Exp. 2, to evaluate of nuclear progression of immature oocytes, collected or in vitro cultured oocytes were transfer into a canine reproductive tract (oviduct, ovarian bursa and uterus). The recovery rates of canine oocytes from a reproductive tract after 4 days $(33.7\%)$ in vivo culture were significantly higher than those 5 $(17.7\%)$ 6 day $(3.4\%)$ (P<0.05). The survival rates of collected oocytes after 4 days $(60.0\%)$ were also significantly higher than those of 5 days $(30.2\%)$ and 6 days $(38.9\%)$ (P<0.05). The meiotic resumption rates of canine oocytes were not significantly difference among the culture periods at 4 days $(5.9\%)$, 5 days $(0.0\%)$ and 6 days $(0.0\%)$. These results show that the nuclear progression of canine immature oocytes from in in vivo culture was not affect the nuclear resumption of oocytes.

• Korean Journal of Animal Reproduction
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.171-176
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• 1998

This study was carried out to confirm whether the in vivo developmental potential of mouse hatched blastocysts (HBs) can be obtained by vitrification method using the cryoprotectant EFS35. The HBs ($\theta$ 130$\mu\textrm{m}$) were cultured in vitro until day 5 from zygotes produced in vivo and were equilibrated in 10% ethylene glycol(EG) for 5 min, and then were exposed or vitrified in EFS35 (35% EG, 18% Ficoll and 0.3M sucrose). After 30 min thawing, re-expanding HBs were transferred into one or both uterine horns of pseudopregnant recipients on day 3 (4~6 embryos /horn). Pregnancy rates of recipients and implantation were assessed by autopsy on day 15 of gestation. The results obtained in these experiments were summarized as follows : After thaw-ing, in vitro survival of HBs was not significantly different between exposed (65.5%) and vitrified(54.5%) group. Also, when the in vivo development potential was examined, total implantation was not different between control (58.5% ) and vitrified (41.0%) group, although the live fetus formation of vitrified group (24.0%) was significantly lower than that of control (58.3%) group (p< 0.05). These results suggested that vitrification freezing method of mouse HBs using EFS35 can be used to make wide the utility of embryo transfer of the more embryos produced in vitro.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• v.30 no.4
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• pp.585-592
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• 2017

Objective: The present study investigates pre- and post-implantation developmental competence of nuclear-transferred porcine embryos derived from male and female fetal fibroblasts. Methods: Male and female fetal fibroblasts were transferred to in vitro-matured enucleated oocytes and in vitro and in vivo developmental competence of reconstructed embryos was investigated. And, a total of 6,789 female fibroblast nuclear-transferred embryos were surgically transferred into 41 surrogate gilts and 4,746 male fibroblast nuclear-transferred embryos were surgically transferred into 25 surrogate gilts. Results: The competence to develop into blastocysts was not significantly different between the sexes. The mean cell number of female and male cloned blastocysts obtained by in vivo culture ($143.8{\pm}10.5$ to $159.2{\pm}14.8$) was higher than that of in vitro culture of somatic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT) groups ($31.4{\pm}8.3$ to $33.4{\pm}11.1$). After embryo transfer, 5 pregnant gilts from each treatment delivered 15 female and 22 male piglets. The average birth weight of the cloned piglets, gestation length, and the postnatal survival rates were not significantly different (p<0.05) between sexes. Conclusion: The present study found that the sex difference of the nuclear donor does not affect the developmental rate of porcine SCNT embryos. Furthermore, postnatal survivability of the cloned piglets was not affected by the sex of the donor cell.

• Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences
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• v.25 no.2
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• pp.90-100
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• 2022

Cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) have posed serious public health problems, accounting for nearly 30% of mortality worldwide and their incidence is still increasing. Therefore, new treatment resources are necessary to prevent or manage the ever-increasing population of patients with CVDs. Sea cucumber is well known for its medical and health benefit effects, but it is not well known what/how effect it has on vascular disease. In the present study, we examined the protect effect of sea cucumber, Apostichopus japonicus 80% ethanol extract (AJE) on zebrafish embryo with the stimulation of free fatty acid, palmitate (PA). In vivo study showed that AJE can attenuate PA-induced toxicity through relieving the rapid heartbeat, increasing the survival rate and reducing the malformation in both wild type and Tg (fli1a:eGFP) transgenic zebrafish lines. Additionally, compare with PA treated embryos, the yolk sac area, body length, axial vascular segment (AVS) and intersegmental vessel (ISV) of the co-treatment group of AJE and PA were comparable to the control group. Moreover, AJE lowered the expression of inducible nitric oxide synthase (iNOS), nitric oxide (NO) and inflammation-related genes induced by PA, and inhibited PA-induced vascular development disorders. Our data preliminarily verify that AJE could be a candidate resource for the prevention or therapy of CVDs.

• Journal of Embryo Transfer
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• v.25 no.3
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• pp.145-148
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• 2010

Oxygen consumption has been regarded as a useful indicator for assessment of mammalian embryo quality. This study was performed to investigate whether oxygen consumption reflects morphological grade of in vivo derived bovine blastocyst-stage embryos (blastocyst). The oxygen consumption of in vitro produced blastocyst was compared to its total cell number. In addition, pregnant rate was measured after transplantation of in vivo blastocysts with different oxygen consumption. The quality of blastocyst collected on day 7 after artificial insemination was categorized as grade I and II (G I and G II) based on microscopic observation of the morphology. Oxygen consumption of blastocyst was measured using a scanning electrochemical microscopy (SECM) and total cell number of in vitro blastocyst was enumerated by counting cells stained by propidium iodide. Pregnancy of recipient cow was confirmed with rectal palpation after 60 days of embryo transfer. The oxygen consumptions of G I blastocysts were significantly higher than those of G II blastocysts ($10.2{\times}10^{15}/mol\;s^{-1}$ versus $6.4{\times}10^{15}/mol\;s^{-1}$, p<0.05). Total cell numbers of in vitro blastocysts were 74.8, 90.7, and 110.2 in the oxygen consumption of below 10.0, 10.0~12.0, and over $12.0{\sim}10^{15}/mol\;s^{-1}$ respectively. Total cell number was significantly increased in embryos with high oxygen consumption (p<0.05). Pregnant rate in recipient cow was 0, 50, and 85.7% in the transplantation of embryo with the oxygen consumption of below 10.0, 10.0~12.0, and over $12.0{\times}10^{15}/mol\;s^{-1}$, respectively. These results suggest that measurement of oxygen consumption may help increase the pregnant rate of bovine embryos.

• Clinical and Experimental Reproductive Medicine
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• v.27 no.4
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• pp.345-351
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• 2000

Objective: Hatching of the blastocyst from the zona pellucida (ZP) is a key event in mammalian implantation. In vivo, two factors have been identified as possible mediators of hatching: lysis of the ZP by substances elaborated either from the embryo or female reproductive tract and pressure exerted on the zona by expansion of the blastocyst. Two methods of zona manipulation were already in use to enhance the ability of embryos to hatch: mechanical PZD and chemical ZD by acidic Tyrode's solution. But several controversies of each method have been reported. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of pronase for mouse embryo hatching. Methods: Mouse embryos were obtained following ovulation induction of $F_1$ animals. Fresh and cryo-thawed morula embryos were exposed to 0.5, 1.0, 2.0, 5.0 ${\mu}g/ml$ pronase in Ham's F10 for 72 hrs. Main outcome measures were the rates of partial hatching and completely hatched blastocysts, and cell number of it. Results: In fresh and cryo-thawed group, the rates of completely hatched blastocyst were significantly higher in 5 ${\mu}g/ml$ pronase treatment group than control group. There was no difference in completely hatched blastocyst total cell number between pronase treatment group and control group. This suggest that pronase treatment did not harmful in mouse embryo development. In pronase treatment group, zona pellucida were thinner than control group. Conclusion: The addition of pronase to culture media may accelerate the hatching of embryo. So, enzymatic treatment of the zona may provide a valuable and effective assisted hatching technique for human in-vitro fertilization-embryo transfer.

• Journal of the Korean Applied Science and Technology
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• v.39 no.3
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• pp.442-453
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• 2022

Various animal models have been used to study the efficacy and action mechanisms of human diseases and medicines. Zebrafish (Danio rerio) is increasingly and successfully used as a model in translational research on human diseases. We obtained necessary information from original peer reviewed articles published in scientific 54 journals, such as Pubmed, Google Scholar, Scopus scince their inception until Dec, 2020 using the following terms: zebrafish animal models, herbal medicine, in vivo screening. In this review, we discuss the recent contributions of the various zebrafish disease models to study of herbal medicines. We focused on cancer, eye diseases, vascular diseases, diabetes and its complications, and cosmetic dermatology. We also highlight the molecular action mechanisms of medicines against these disease, demonstrated using zebrafish embryo. Zebrafish can be pivotal in bridging the gap from lab to clinical bedside. It is used as a model to understand human diseases pathogenies with further scope for drug development. Furthermore, zebrafish can reduce rat and mouse animals in biomedical research.