Vitrificación de embriones bovinos cultivados en un medio suplementado con β-mercaptoetanol

This study aimed to evaluate different concentrations of β-mercaptoethanol (β-ME) during in vitro culture of bovine embryos and determine the effect of vitrification on survival rate of embryos cultured in a medium supplemented with ß-ME. Experiment 1: Post-fertilization, zygotes were assigned to culture groups with 0, 50, 100 and 150 µM β-ME. Experiment 2: zygotes were cultured in presence or absence of 100 µM β-ME followed by vitrification by Cryologic method. Survival, total cell number and apoptotic rate were used as quality and cryotolerance indicator. Cleavage rate follows a negative linear trend, and it was lower at 150 µM concentration of β-ME, no differences were found between the other concentrations. Percentage of embryos follows a quadratic trend showing the greatest response to a concentration of 100 µM of β-ME. It was shown that supplementation with 100 µM of β-ME during in vitro culture increased survival rate and total cells number and reduced the apoptosis.