As the female cow matures, the majority of her follicles become atretic and are lost as a store house of the female gamete (oocyte). Emphasis on in vitro fertilization to maximize the utilization of superior animals for transplant of frozen embryos is considerably limited by the number of viable mature oocytes that can be collected. Understanding the biochemical environment required to produce maximum numbers of mature, fertilizable oocytes is a prime requirement to utilize this technology in increasing meat animal production and efficiency.
The goal of these studies was to characterize the endocrine and biochemical events associated with follicle and oocyte maturation to establish the best environment for follicle development and maximize numbers
