Goat MII ooplasts support preimplantation development of embryos cloned from other species

The preimplantation development competences of somatic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT) embryos reconstructed with enuleated goat (Capra hircus) Metaphase II (MII) oocytes matured in vivo and whole cells derived from adult fibroblasts of several mammalian species (goat, boer goat, bovine, tahr, panda) and human patient were evaluated. Results obtained from our experiments revealed that these reconstructed SCNT embryos could complete preimplantation development to form blastocysts. The fusion rate and blastocyst rate of intra-species SCNT embryos (Capra hircus as control) was 78.67 (557/708); 56.29% (264/469), that of sub-species or inter-species SCNT embryos were: boer goat 78.18% (541/692); 33.90% (40/118), bovine 70.53% (146/207); 22.52% (25/111), tahr 53.51% (61/114); 5.26% (3/570), panda 79.82% (1159/1452); 8.35% (75/898) and human 68.76% (317/461); 5.41% (16/296), respectively. It is concluded that (1) there are no relationships between fusion rate and relativeness of the recipient cytoplasm to nucleus donor cells, (2) cytoplast of the goat MII oocyte can support the preimplantation development of SCNT embryos reconstructed with nucleus from other species, (3) the blastocyst rate of close relative inter-species SCNT embryos is higher than that of distant relative inter-species SCNT embryos.