Abstract
Sustaining life beyond Earth either on space stations or on other planets will require a clear understanding of how the space environment affects key phases of mammalian reproduction. However, because of the difficulty of doing such experiments in mammals, most studies of reproduction in space have been carried out with other taxa, such as sea urchins, fish, amphibians or birds. Here, we studied the possibility of mammalian fertilization and preimplantation development under microgravity (µG) conditions using a three-dimensional (3D) clinostat, which faithfully simulates 10–3 G using 3D rotation. Fertilization occurred normally in vitro under µG. However, although we obtained 75 healthy offspring from µG-fertilized and -cultured embryos after transfer to recipient females, the birth rate was lower than among the 1G controls. Immunostaining demonstrated that in vitro culture under µG caused slower development and fewer trophectoderm cells than in 1G controls but did not affect polarization of the blastocyst. These results suggest for the first time that fertilization can occur normally under µG environment in a mammal, but normal preimplantation embryo development might require 1G.
Highlights
Changes in the gravitational field have significant effects on the development of plants and animals [1]
Two of the females were reported to have achieved pregnancy, but the embryos appear to have been resorbed. This experiment did not examine whether fertilization or preimplantation development occurred normally, this raised the important question of whether mammalian reproduction is possible in space
Effects of mG on in vitro fertilization (IVF) At 6 h after In vitro fertilization (IVF), the clinostat was stopped, and zygotes were collected from the culture flasks
Summary
Changes in the gravitational field have significant effects on the development of plants and animals [1]. Two of the females were reported to have achieved pregnancy, but the embryos appear to have been resorbed This experiment did not examine whether fertilization or preimplantation development occurred normally, this raised the important question of whether mammalian reproduction is possible in space. Further such experiments have not been performed so far because of technical difficulties in using live animals. If mice were to be taken into space, they would be exposed to strong vibrations and hypergravity during the launch, and suddenly exposed to the additional stress of mG conditions In these situations, it is highly unlikely that the mice would copulate during the flight period. In the Cosmos 1129 mission, there were no pregnancies even among the ground-based 1G controls [15]
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