Follicular fluid content and oocyte quality: from single biochemical markers to metabolomics

The assessment of oocyte quality in human in vitro fertilization (IVF) is getting increasing attention from embryologists. Oocyte selection and the identification of the best oocytes, in fact, would help to limit embryo overproduction and to improve the results of oocyte cryostorage programs. Follicular fluid (FF) is easily available during oocyte pick-up and theorically represents an optimal source on non-invasive biochemical predictors of oocyte quality. Unfortunately, however, the studies aiming to find a good molecular predictor of oocyte quality in FF were not able to identify substances that could be used as reliable markers of oocyte competence to fertilization, embryo development and pregnancy. In the last years, a well definite trend toward passing from the research of single molecular markers to more complex techniques that study all metabolites of FF has been observed. The metabolomic approach is a powerful tool to study biochemical predictors of oocyte quality in FF, but its application in this area is still at the beginning. This review provides an overview of the current knowledge about the biochemical predictors of oocyte quality in FF, describing both the results coming from studies on single biochemical markers and those deriving from the most recent studies of metabolomic

Fe(II) reduction of pyrolusite (β-MnO2) and secondary mineral evolution

Abstract Iron (Fe) and manganese (Mn) are the two most common redox-active elements in the Earth’s crust and are well known to influence mineral formation and dissolution, trace metal sequestration, and contaminant transformations in soils and sediments. Here, we characterized the reaction of aqueous Fe(II) with pyrolusite (β-MnO2) using electron microscopy, X-ray diffraction, aqueous Fe and Mn analyses, and 57Fe Mössbauer spectroscopy. We reacted pyrolusite solids repeatedly with 3 mM Fe(II) at pH 7.5 to evaluate whether electron transfer occurs and to track the evolving reactivity of the Mn/Fe solids. We used Fe isotopes (56 and 57) in conjunction with 57Fe Mössbauer spectroscopy to isolate oxidation of Fe(II) by Fe(III) precipitates or pyrolusite. Using these complementary techniques, we determined that Fe(II) is initially oxidized by pyrolusite and that lepidocrocite is the dominant Fe oxidation product. Additional Fe(II) exposures result in an increasing proportion of magnetite on the pyrolusite surface. Over a series of nine 3 mM Fe(II) additions, Fe(II) continued to be oxidized by the Mn/Fe particles suggesting that Mn/Fe phases are not fully passivated and remain redox active even after extensive surface coverage by Fe(III) oxides. Interestingly, the initial Fe(III) oxide precipitates became further reduced as Fe(II) was added and additional Mn was released into solution suggesting that both the Fe oxide coating and underlying Mn phase continue to participate in redox reactions when freshly exposed to Fe(II). Our findings indicate that Fe and Mn chemistry is influenced by sustained reactions of Fe(II) with Mn/Fe oxides

Transcriptome de novo assembly from next-generation sequencing and comparative analyses in the hexaploid salt marsh species Spartina maritima and Spartina alterniflora (Poaceae)

Plateforme BioGenouest 'Environmental and Functional Genomics'; Genouest Bioinformatics PlateformInternational audienceSpartina species have a critical ecological role in salt marshes and represent an excellent system to investigate recurrent polyploid speciation. Using the 454 GS-FLX pyrosequencer, we assembled and annotated the first reference transcriptome (from roots and leaves) for two related hexaploid Spartina species that hybridize in Western Europe, the East American invasive Spartina alterniflora and the Euro-African S. maritima. The de novo read assembly generated 38 478 consensus sequences and 99% found an annotation using Poaceae databases, representing a total of 16 753 non-redundant genes. Spartina expressed sequence tags were mapped onto the Sorghum bicolor genome, where they were distributed among the subtelomeric arms of the 10 S. bicolor chromosomes, with high gene density correlation. Normalization of the complementary DNA library improved the number of annotated genes. Ecologically relevant genes were identified among GO biological function categories in salt and heavy metal stress response, C4 photosynthesis and in lignin and cellulose metabolism. Expression of some of these genes had been found to be altered by hybridization and genome duplication in a previous microarray-based study in Spartina. As these species are hexaploid, up to three duplicated homoeologs may be expected per locus. When analyzing sequence polymorphism at four different loci in S. maritima and S. alterniflora, we found up to four haplotypes per locus, suggesting the presence of two expressed homoeologous sequences with one or two allelic variants each. This reference transcriptome will allow analysis of specific Spartina genes of ecological or evolutionary interest, estimation of homoeologous gene expression variation using RNAseq and further gene expression evolution analyses in natural populations