Development of IVF Porcine Embryos in Microwell Culture System

We investigated the development of IVF porcine embryos incubated in microwells of Well-of-the-Well (WOW) culture dishes. In Experiment 1, 500 embryos were cultured under five different culture conditions: 10 individual embryos in microwells covered by 50 μL PZM-3 medium (50 μL WOW); 10 embryos together in a well of 50 μL PZM-3 (50 μL Well); 10 embryos in microwells covered by 20 μL PZM-3 (20 μL WOW); 10 embryos in a well of 20 μL PZM-3 (20 μL Well); and 10 embryos in a 20 μL drop of PZM-3 in traditional dishes (control). In Experiment 2, the best-performing treatment group from Experiment 1 (50 μL WOW) was further compared to control using a total of 350 embryos. There was no difference in the percentage of cleaved embryos among the groups in both experiments. In Experiment 1, the percentage of blastocysts from 50 μL WOW (42.00 ± 6.29%) was higher (p = 0.001) than in 50 μL Well (29.00 ± 4.58%), 20 μL WOW (13.00 ± 2.13%), 20 μL Well (20.00 ± 2.98%) and control (25.00 ± 5.22%). Similarly, in Experiment 2, blastocyst formation and nuclei number in the blastocysts from 50 μL WOW (37.86 ± 3.95% and 38.97 ± 1.80) were higher (p = 0.040 and p = 0.017) than in the control (28.10 ± 2.64% and 33.21 ± 1.56). The results indicate that individual culture in microwells improves the development of IVF pig embryos.