background: anti-mullerian hormone (amh) is constantly secreted during menstrual cycles and may offer several advantages over traditional biomarkers of ovarian reserve. objective: to assess the relationship of anti-mullerian hormone (amh) values, which are used to evaluate ovary reserves, with oocyte and embryo quality and with art outcomes in patients undergoing intra-cytoplasmic sperm injecti...

background: abnormal oocyte morphology has been associated with the hormonal environment to which the gametes are exposed. objective: in this study, we evaluated the oocytes morphology, fertilization rate, embryos quality, and implantation rate resulted of retrieved oocytes in different times after human chorionic gonadotrophin (hcg) administration. materials and methods: a total of 985 metapha...

Background Although ovarian tissue cryopreservation and transplantation is used for fertility preservation in patient undergoing cytotoxic treatments but obtaining good quality oocyte is still a debate. Xenotransplantation has been introduced as a reliable technique for better understanding of the transplantation conditions, but to achieve healthy embryos, the quality of obtained oocytes need t...

Background: The biochemical characteristics of the follicular fluid (FF) play essential role in oocyte quality, the subsequent fertilization potential and embryo development. The oocyte quality and metabolism largely depends on follicular microenvironment. Present study aimed to investigate the relationship between oocyte quality and FF homocysteine (Hcy) level in women undergoing to IVF treatm...

Oocyte quality is a key limiting factor in female fertility, yet we have a poor understanding of what constitutes oocyte quality or the mechanisms governing it. The ovarian follicular microenvironment and maternal signals, mediated primarily through granulosa cells (GCs) and cumulus cells (CCs), are responsible for nurturing oocyte growth, development and the gradual acquisition of oocyte devel...

Mitochondria play vital roles in oocyte functions and they are critical indicators of oocyte quality which is important for fertilization and development into viable offspring. Quality-compromised oocytes are correlated with infertility, developmental disorders, reduced blastocyst cell number and embryo loss in which mitochondrial dysfunctions play a significant role. Increasingly, women affect...

Elder women suffer from low or loss of fertility because of decreasing oocyte quality as maternal aging. As energy resource, mitochondria play pivotal roles in oocyte development, determining oocyte quality. With advanced maternal age, increased dysfunctions emerge in oocyte mitochondria, which decrease oocyte quality and its developmental potential. Mitochondria supplement as a possible strate...

CAPSULE Mechanisms that control the survival of oocytes and, by extension, the duration of ovarian function have been identified. However, it is still not clear whether oocyte "quality" is related to survival, nor is the role of the granulosa cells of follicles in follicle survival entirely understood. Here, we consider oocyte-intrinsic and oocyte-extrinsic mechanisms of oocyte loss and argue t...

Reproductive cessation is perhaps the earliest aging phenotype that humans experience. Similarly, reproduction of Caenorhabditis elegans ceases in mid-adulthood. Although somatic aging has been studied in both worms and humans, mechanisms regulating reproductive aging are not yet understood. Here, we show that TGF-β Sma/Mab and Insulin/IGF-1 signaling regulate C. elegans reproductive aging by m...

The assessment of oocyte quality in human in vitro fertilization (IVF) is getting increasing attention from embryologists. Oocyte selection and the identification of the best oocytes, in fact, would help to limit embryo overproduction and to improve the results of oocyte cryostorage programs. Follicular fluid (FF) is easily available during oocyte pick-up and theorically represents an optimal s...