Effect of anordrin on the development of mouse preimplantation embryos in vitro

The in vitro effect of anordrin and anordiol on the development of mouse two-cell embryos was studied.

Female mice were primed with gonadotropins for superovulation and caged with male mice. Preimplantation embryos, at the two-cell stage, were recovered from the oviducts at 40 hr post-hCG. In the first experiment, two-cell embryos were exposed to culture medium containing different concentrations of anordrin for 3, 12, 24, and 80 hr and then grown in the anordrin-free culture medium and assessed for the formation of total and hatching blastocysts at 80 hr. In the second experiment, two-cell embryos were grown in culture medium containing different concentrations of anordiol and assessed for the formation of total and hatching blastocysts at 80 hr in vitro.

Exposure of two-cell embryos to anordrin concentrations of 2.5-7.5 micrograms/ml for 12 hr, 2.5-5.0 micrograms/ml for 24 hr, and 2.5 micrograms/ml for 80 hr caused significant inhibition of the formation of total blastocysts and to 2.5-7.5 micrograms/ml for 12 hr, 1.0-2.5 micrograms/ml for 24 hr, and 1.0 micrograms/ml for 80 hr caused significant inhibition of the formation of hatching blastocysts, in a exposure time-dependent and dose-dependent manner. Exposure of two-cell embryos to anordiol concentrations of 15-25 micrograms/ml for 80 hr caused significant inhibition of the formation of total blastocysts and to 15-20 micrograms/ml for 80 hr caused significant inhibition of the formation of hatching blastocysts in a dose-dependent manner.

Anordrin and its metabolite anordiol inhibit the development of two-cell embryos in vitro.