In VitroSteroid Secretion by Intact Bovine Ovarian Follicles in a Superfusion System

Abstract

A superfusion system for single intact follicles is described. Bovine follicles were superfused for 5 to 10 hours. Progesterone and testosterone secretion was stable after an adaptation period of 150 min. A 5-minute stimulation with hCG resulted in a 2-fold increase in progesterone secretion. Superfusion for 450 minutes of 3 small follicles of similar size and in the same ovary next to each other showed different secretion patterns of progesterone and testosterone. Superfusion for 150 minutes of follicles obtained from 2 pairs of ovaries showed that follicular size is not a sufficient criterion to predict the progesterone and testosterone secretion pattern. Closeness of follicles (big or small) to a corpus luteum did not impair their ability to secrete progesterone and testosterone. It is concluded that a superfusion system as has been described in this report is an effective and desirable method to study the physiology and pathophysiology of single intact follicles.

Factors influencing the rate of preantral and antral growth of mouse ovarian follicles in vitro

“…Antral follicle culture has mainly involved short-term incubation (2 days or less) of large antral follicles either for measuring steroid secretion (Bogovich & Richards, 1982;Laufer et al, 1982;Vanhems et al, 1982;Carlsson et al, 1985;Zimmerman et al, 1985) or for achieving intrafollicular oocyte maturation for production of live offspring (Moor & Trounson, 1977;Fukui et al, 1987). Short-term incubations of isolated cumulus-granulosa-oocyte complexes have resulted in the growth and meiotic maturation of oocytes in vitro (Eppig & Downs, 1987) and embryonic development resulting in some normal offspring in mice (Schroeder & Eppig, 1984;Eppig & Schroeder, 1989) and in large animals (Staigmiller & Moor, 1984;Fukui et al, 1988;Goto et al, 1988).…”

Influence of luteinizing hormone and prostaglandin F2α on progesterone secretion in superfused bovine luteal tissue slices

“…Superfusion was started within 25 min after ovariectomy. Superfusion The superfusion technique described by Zimmermann et al (1985) and Hoedemaker et al (1987) was used: M199 gassed with 5 % C02 and 95 % 02 was pumped via teflon tubes into the superfusion chambers at a flow rate of 0.3 ml per min. The superfusate was collected continuously in fractions of 6 ml per 20 min by means of a fraction collector.…”