Sexual dimorphism in developmental programming of the bovine preimplantation embryo caused by colony-stimulating factor 2.


  • Publication date : 2014-09-26

Reference

Dobbs KB, Gagné D, Fournier E, Dufort I, Robert C, Block J, Sirard MA, Bonilla L, Ealy AD, Loureiro B, Hansen PJ. Sexual dimorphism in developmental programming of the bovine preimplantation embryo caused by colony-stimulating factor 2. Biol. Reprod. 2014;91:80. doi: 10.1095/biolreprod.114.121087. PubMed PMID: 25078682.

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Keywords

animals animals, inbred strains blastocyst cattle ectogenesis embryo culture techniques embryo transfer embryonic development endometrium female fertilization in vitro gene expression regulation, developmental interferon type i interleukin-3 male maternal-fetal exchange methylation pregnancy pregnancy proteins protein processing, post-translational random allocation recombinant proteins sex characteristics

Abstract

Physiology of the adult can be modified by alterations in prenatal development driven by the maternal environment. Developmental programming, which can be established before the embryo implants in the uterus, can affect females differently than males. The mechanism by which sex-specific developmental programming is established is not known. Here we present evidence that maternal regulatory signals change female embryos differently than male embryos. In particular, actions of the maternally derived cytokine CSF2 from Day 5 to Day 7 of development affected characteristics of the embryo at Day 15 differently for females than males. CSF2 decreased length and IFNT secretion of female embryos but increased length and IFNT secretion of male embryos. Analysis of a limited number of samples indicated that changes in the transcriptome and methylome caused by CSF2 also differed between female and males. Thus, sex-specific programming by the maternal environment could occur when changes in secretion of maternally derived regulatory molecules alter development of female embryos differently than male embryos.