Resumption of meiosis: mechanism involved in meiotic progression and its relation with developmental competence

It has been more than 10 years since the first calf was born following in vitro maturation of a bovine oocyte. During that period, a number of modifications have been made to the culture conditions during the maturation period but still most oocytes failed to produce viable embryos. Recently, the pretreatment of donors leading to clear improvements in oocyte developmental competence has been achieved. These treatments can be either 1) ovarian stimulation with FSH followed by the slaughter of the animal and the incubation of ovaries before oocyte aspiration or 2) the transvaginal aspiration of oocytes from FSH-stimulated animals following a "coasting period" of 48 hours. These 2 treatments indicate the necessity of preparing the immature oocyte before using it. An alternative to the animal pretreatment would be to recreate in vitro the conditions present in more mature follicles. It is believed that the ability of the oocyte to become an embryo depends on the accumulation of specific information in the form of mRNA or proteins. Because the consequences of that change become visible 4 days later at the early 8-cell stage, the favorite hypothesis is that the oocyte accumulates stable mRNA and that accumulation requires an active transcription machinery. Therefore, to improve oocyte's potential, follicular instructions must be given before the germinal vesicle breakdown induced by oocyte aspiration and culture. The culture of bovine oocytes in a state of meiotic arrest could potentially allow the correct follicular signal(s) to change the development potential of an oocyte. The unraveling of the mechanism for cell control of meiotic arrest opens the way to a functional and reversible culture system for immature oocytes. The remaining challenge is to discover follicular signals or factors to apply during the in vitro culture period to enhance the competence of oocytes.