• Proceedings of the KSAR Conference
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• 2002.06a
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• pp.71-71
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• 2002

Our previous study has suggested that muscarinic receptor present in the mouse oocytes, and Ca/sup 2+/ waves elicited by acetylcholine (ACh) are similar to those induced by sperm. A numerous study reported that ACh could cause early activation events in mouse oocytes overexpressing the Ml muscarinic receptor (Williams et al., 1992; Moore et al., 1993; Kim et al., 1998). However, the physiological role of ACh during mouse embryonic development is poorly understood. (omitted)

• Natural Product Sciences
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• v.25 no.2
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• pp.157-164
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• 2019

The study was conducted to investigate the acute and sub-acute toxicity effect of Aquilaria malaccensis leaves aqueous extract (AEAM) towards male ICR mice in terms of body weight, relative organ weight, mortality rate and sperm parameters. In acute toxicity study, a single dose at of 2000 mg/kg was performed. In sub-acute toxicity study, the mice were received normal saline (control group), 50, 100, 150, 200, 500, or 1000 mg/kg of AEAM orally for 21 days of treatment. In sub-acute toxicity study, the number of abnormal sperm were significantly decreased in AEAM 100, 150, 200, 500, and 1000 when compared to the control group. While, the motility of sperm were found to be significantly increased in AEAM 100, 150, 200, and 1000 as compared to the control group. No mortality was recorded in the control group and treated groups in both toxicity studies except for one mouse from AEAM 1000 group. However, the mild sedative effect in terms of the tendency to sleep was clearly noticeable in both toxicity studies. Results indicated that the AEAM can be one of the useful alternative medicine to enhance fertility rate by increasing healthy sperm production.

• Development and Reproduction
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• v.5 no.1
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• pp.53-57
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• 2001

Sperm capacitation and acrosome reaction (AR) have been known to be Ca$^{2+}$-dependent events. Sperm capacitation accompanies with cholesterol efflux fiom plasma membrane, that eventually stimulates AR. However, whether the AR mediated by cholesterol efflux is Ca$^{2+}$ dependent has not been verified yet. Recently, methyl beta cyclodextrin (MBCD) was found to evoke AR by stimulating the cholesterol efflux fiom sperm membrane. In the present study, we examined the requirement of Ca$^{2+}$ in the MBCD-induced AR. During incubation of sperm in the bicarbonate buffered media MBCD increased AR in a dose-dependent manner regardless of the Ca$^{2+}$ presence. In the presence of low molar concentration of Ca$^{2+}$ (100 ${\mu}$M), MBCD-induced AR was slightly increased compared to Ca$^{2+}$-free condition. In the absence of Ca$^{2+}$ supplement, spontaneous AR was slightly increased during the incubation but inhibited by 100 ${\mu}$M EGTA. MBCD potentiated AR even the presence of EGTA. However, EGTA attenuated MBCD-induced AR, suagesting the functional involvement of intracellular Ca$^{2+}$ in the MBCD-induced AR. Taken together, it was suggested that cholesterol efflux from the sperm plasma membrane was sufficient for induction of AR even in the absence of extracellular Ca$^{2+}$and that a condition permissive for mobilization of intracellular Ca$^{2+}$ is important for MBCD-induced AR.

• Korean Journal of Animal Reproduction
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.115-124
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• 1990

These experiments were undertaken as a basic study to develop immunocontraceptive vaccine and to understand the role of zona pellucidae in early fertilization process by investigating the effect of monoclonal and polyclonal antibody to porcine zona pellucidae and polyclonal antibody to mouse zona pellucidae on the fertilization of porcine and mouse eggs in vitro. The results obtained in these experiments were summarized as follows : 1. Treatment of porcine and mouse eggs with undiluted anti-zona serum produced intense precipitation layer on the poricne and mouse zonae, respectively, thus resulting in the total inhibition of sperm adherence on surface of zona. 2. In vitro fertilization of eggs pre-treated with 0.3∼10% of various antibodies was examined, and resulting in that 5 and 10% of rabbit polyclonal antibodies to porcine zona inhibited completely both in vitro fertilization and polyspermy of porcine eggs while monoclonal to porcine zona and rabbit polyclonal antibody to mouse zona did not inhibit in vitro fertilization but monoclonal antibody reduced the rate of polyspermy compared to that of control group. Almost the same results were obtained in the study on the effect of anti-zona serum on in vitro fertilization of mouse eggs.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Developmental Biology Conference
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• 2004.07a
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• pp.26-26
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• 2004

• Korean Journal of Animal Reproduction
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• v.25 no.2
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• pp.163-169
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• 2001

OSBA(oocytes-sperm binding assay) is a tool developed for rapid test of optimal condition of IVF medium and protein source by binding ability of mouse sperm and egg. Mouse oocyte-cumulus complexes were prepared by removing of the cumulus cells with 0.1% hyaluronidase. 10$\pm$2 oocytes per 30 ${mu}ell$ medium drop were inseminated with 3 ${mu}ell$ sperm suspension and were cultured f3r 3 hours and 24 hours, respectively. And the oocytes were recovered gently and the No. of sperm bound on oocytes were counted. In the Exp. 1, the ratio of oocytes bound with one sperm at least were 60.2%(50/83), 2%(2/77) and 100%(79/79) in the medium with no protein, FBS(15%, v/v) and BSA(0.4%. w/v), respectively, Fetal bovine serum(FBS) seriously inhibited sperm binding on oocyte, although bovine serum albumin(BSA) promoted the binding ability. The inhibiting effect of FBS was dependent on the concentration of FBS. The sperm binding ability according to oocyte maturity was tested in the Exp. 2. There was no significant difference between Met. II (mature) and Met. I (intermediate mature) oocytes in the number of oocytes bound with sperm and the number of sperm bound on oocytes. Finally, in Exp. 3, two batches of Ham's F10 medium with good and poor quality by OSBA were tested (The ratios of embryos developed from PN 1-cell stage to hatched blastocyst; 25% vs. 70%). In the medium with good quality, sperm binding ability was significantly increased (P ＜ 0.05). The ratio of oocytes bound with one sperm at least was 66% and 90% in the medium with poor and good quality, respectively. Conclusively, It was possible to test IVF medium condition rapidly and easily by OSBA.

• Molecules and Cells
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• v.20 no.3
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• pp.423-428
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• 2005

Immediately after fertilization, a chromatin remodeling process in the oocyte cytoplasm extracts protamine molecules from the sperm-derived DNA and loads histones onto it. We examined how the histone H3-lysine 9 methylation system is established on the remodeled sperm chromatin in mice. We found that the paternal pronucleus was not stained for dimethylated H3-K9 (H3-$m_2K9$) during pronucleus development, while the maternal genome stained intensively. Such H3-$m_2K9$ asymmetry between the parental pronuclei was independent of $HP1{\beta}$ localization and, much like DNA methylation, was preserved to the two-cell stage when the nucleus appeared to be compartmentalized for H3-$m_2K9$. A conspicuous increase in H3-$m_2K9$ level was observed at the four-cell stage, and then the level was maintained without a visible change up to the blastocyst stage. The behavior of H3-$m_2K9$ was very similar, but not identical, to that of 5-methylcytosine during preimplantation development, suggesting that there is some connection between methylation of histone and of DNA in early mouse development.

• Biomedical Science Letters
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• v.23 no.4
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• pp.372-379
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• 2017

This study was investigated to test whether paternal DNA that was destined for degradation was properly licensed by testing for the presence of mini-chromosome maintenance protein (MCM) 7 and origin recognition complex (ORC) 2 in the paternal pronuclei. ORC2 is one of the first licensing protein to come on and MCM7 is one of the last licensing protein to come on. Zygotes were prepared by injection of control and treated sperm injection (ICSI). To control for DNA breakage, epididymal spermatozoa were treated with DNase I to fragment the DNA, then injected into oocytes. The presence of MCM7 and ORC2 in the pronuclei of mouse zygotes was tested by immunohistochemistry, just before the onset of DNA synthesis, at 5 h after fertilization, and after DNA synthesis began, at 9 h post fertilization. We found that in all cases, both MCM7 and ORC2 were present in both pronuclei at 5 h after sperm injection, just before DNA synthesis began. This indicates that no matter how extensive the DNA damage, recruitment of licensing proteins to the origins of replication was not inhibited. Sperm DNA fragmentation does not prevent licensing of DNA replication origins. Furthermore, the embryo recognizes DNA that is damaged by nucleases. Our data indicate that the one-cell embryo does harbor a mechanism to prevent the replication of severely damaged DNA from spermatozoa, even though the embryos do not undergo classical apoptosis.

• The Korean Journal of Zoology
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• v.38 no.3
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• pp.395-404
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• 1995

In order to study the process of spermiogenesis of the korean striped field mouse Apodemus agrorfus coreae, the cell differentiation of seminiferous epithelium and morphological features of mature sperm in cauda epididymis was examined and the results are as follows: Spermiogenesis was divided, according to the features of cell structure; Golgi, cap, acrosome and spermiation phases were further subdivided into two steps of early and late phases respectively, and maturation phase has only one step. Hence, the spermiogenesis consists of nine phases. in the changes of the chromatin in nucleus, the chromatin granules began to be condensed in the cap phase and the condensation proceeded to form a globular of nucleus at the acrsome phase. Finally, the chromatin regularization was completed and perfect nucleus of sperm was formed at the maturation phase. Sperm head had the falciform, and the outer dence fibers of middle piece were arranged in a horseshoe fashion. The outer dence fiber number 1, 5, 6 and 9 was larger than other fiber number 2, 3, 4, 7, 8.

• Korean Journal of Animal Reproduction
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.113-120
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• 1993

To provide the optimal culture conditions for the developm,ent of in vit개 produced embryos, we have been investigated various culture media as well as co-cultrue systems using porcine cumulus cells or mouse fetal fibroblast cells. Porcine ovaries were brought to the laboratory from local slaughter house within 1 hour after slaughtering and cumulus oocytes complexes were recovered from antral follicles(3~5mm) with 23 gauge needle. To maturate follicular oocytes, cumulus oocytes complexes were washed three times with TCM-199 containing 25mM HEPES and incubated(39$^{\circ}C$, 5% CO2 in air) in various maturation media for 42 hrs. Ejaculated and liquid storaged boar spermatozoa capacitated with different sperm capacitation methods and media were rpepared for fertilizing of matured follicular oocytes in vitro. Fertilization was performed by adding 5~10${\mu}\ell$ fo capacitated spermatozoa containing 1~5$\times$105 sperm/ml to droplets. Eighteen to twenty-eight hours after sperm insemination, fertilized eggs were washed three times with culture media and transferred to the various culture media, to the culture media with a monolayer of somatic cells. The in vitro development rates of 1-cell embryos cultured with three times with culture media and transferred to the various culture media, to the culture media with a monolayer of somatic cells. The in vitro development rates of 1-cell embryos cultured with three different media, m-KRB, BECM and TCM-HEPES were 0~1.0%, showing extremely lower rates. Especially, most of embryos were observed to arrest the development beyond 4-cell stages. The rates of embryos developed to 2-, 4-, 8-, 16-, 32-cell and morula or blastocyst stage in co-culture with porcine cumulus cells and mouse fetal fibroblast cells were 61.1~67.0%, 59.0~58.0%, 42.5~43.1%, 28.4~30.2% and 20.4~21.0%, respectively. These development rates upto morula or blastocyst stages were significantly higher than those of the embryos cultured in the basic culture medium(P<0.01). These findings suggest that co-culture of in vitro fertilized eggs with porcine cumulus cells or mouse fetal fibroblast cells enhance the development of fertilized eggs to morula or blastocyst stage in vitro.