Effect of laser-assisted hatching and necrotic blastomere removal on the development of vitrified-warmed four-cell mouse embryos
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Updated: Jul 3, 2026
Morphometric Protocol for the Objective Assessment of Blastocyst Behavior During Vitrification and Warming Steps
Published on: February 28, 2019
Rouhollah Fathi1, Mojtaba Rezazadeh Valojerdi, Poopak Eftekhari-Yazdi
1Department of Anatomy, Faculty of Medical Sciences, Tarbiat Modares University, Tehran, PO Box 14115-111, Iran.
Purpose:
To investigate the effect of laser-assisted hatching and necrotic blastomere removal on the development of vitrified-warmed mouse embryos.
Methods:
The vitrified-warmed four-cell stage mouse embryos were divided into five groups; vitrified intact with no laser-assisted hatching, vitrified intact with laser-assisted hatching, vitrified damaged with neither laser assisted hatching nor necrotic blastomere removal, vitrified damaged with laser-assisted hatching, and vitrified damaged with necrotic blastomere removal. Thereafter blastocyst formation, blastomere and apoptotic cell number within all groups were statistically compared.
Results:
The rate of blastocyst formation showed a significant improvement in the group vitrified intact with laser-assisted hatching. However, neither laser-assisted hatching nor necrotic blastomere removal can improve a delayed vitrified-warmed damaged embryos in term of blastocyst formation and total cell number. Nevertheless, apoptotic cell number was significantly reduced after application of both techniques.
Conclusions:
Laser-assisted hatching can improve the development of vitrified-warmed intact four-cell stage mouse embryos, whereas necrotic blastomere removal has no significant effect on the development of vitrified-warmed four-cell stage damaged embryos.
