Reducing Oxidative Stress in in Vitro Rat Embryo Culture through Antioxidant Supplementation

Abstract

In this study, we aimed to find out whether the use of either ascorbic acid or resveratrol added to KSOM R culture media affects developmental competence of one cell rat embryos by counteracting oxidative stress effects on them. One-cell embryos isolated from superovulated Wistar Albino rats were cultured for 4 days in KSOM R only (control) or in KSOM R containing 50 µM ascorbic acid, 100 µM ascorbic acid, 0.25 µM resveratrol or 0.50 µM resveratrol. The experiments were carried out four times. The 50 µM ascorbic acid group showed 77.3% cleavage rate which was higher than that observed in control group (61.9%) or 100 µM ascorbic acid group (62.6%), p<0.05. In terms of development beyond two cells stage, 50 µM ascorbic acid was more effective than 100 µM ascorbic acid (15.3%) and 0.25 µM resveratrol (13.6%) groups, p<0.05. There were no statistically significant differences between the degeneration rates of different experimental groups. The most appropriate superovulation procedure giving high quality embryos is 20 IU PMSG plus 30 IU hCG. Based on the results obtained, a moderate concentration of ascorbic acid (50 µM) enhances the early cleavage and further development of rat embryos under aerobic conditions, while a high concentration of ascorbic acid or resveratrol offered no added advantages.