EMBRYO TECHNOLOGIES FOR PROPAGATION OF RHESUS MONKEYS

描述（由申请人提供）： 本申请的总体目标是评估对ART开发重要的协议，该协议可以增强人类疾病的NHP模型的传播。 使用ART从具有遗传价值的动物中生产胚胎，可以促进与人类健康相关的广泛研究，从不孕症到退行性疾病。 然而，NHP的基本ART程序，如胚胎移植和同卵双胞胎的生产，目前的状况很差。 很少有研究致力于改善这些程序。 拟议的研究将使用标准的体外受精和胚胎培养方案常规生产恒河猴胚胎，以评估几种不同的技术方法，以提高用于健康相关研究的动物生产。 这个资源开发应用程序的目的是评估：1）战略（胚胎的数目和阶段），以提高生产后代的成功率; 2）猕猴的跨物种胚胎移植，以促进子宫内移植; 3）卵裂球分离或胚胎分裂的简单方法产生同卵双胞胎的有效性; 4）通过超数排卵和子宫冲洗在体内产生多个胚胎的程序，从而避免了培养体外产生的胚胎可能产生的假象;和5）植入前遗传学诊断，作为在胚胎移植之前选择具有特定遗传特征的猕猴胚胎的工具，作为提高ART繁殖有遗传价值的动物的效率的手段。 通过结合这些技术，研究人员将提高NHP在健康相关研究中的功效和效用，增加具有遗传价值的动物的繁殖力，并提高在繁殖NHP时选择特定遗传特征的能力。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The overall goal of this application is to evaluate protocols important for the exploitation of ART that can enhance the propagation of NHP models of human disease. The use of ART to produce embryos from genetically valuable animals can contribute to a wide range of studies related to human health, from infertility to degenerative diseases. However, the current state of basic ART procedures in NHPs, such as embryo transfer and production of identical twins, is poor. Few studies have been devoted to improving these procedures. The proposed research will routinely produce embryos from rhesus monkeys using standard in vitro fertilization and embryo culture protocols in order to evaluate several different technical approaches to improve the production of animals for health related research. The aims of this resource development application are to evaluate: 1) strategies (number and stage of embryos) for transferring embryos to recipient females, in order to improve the success rate in producing offspring; 2) cross-species embryo transfer in macaques, in order to facilitate intra-uterine transfers; 3) the effectiveness of simple methods of blastomere separation or embryo splitting to produce identical twins; 4) a procedure for producing multiple embryos in vivo by superovulation and uterine flushing, thus avoiding possible artifacts from culturing in vitro produced embryos; and 5) preimplantation genetic diagnosis as a tool for selecting macaque embryos with specific genetic characteristics prior to embryo transfer, as a means to increase the efficiency of ART for propagating genetically valuable animals. By combining several of these technologies, the investigators will enhance the efficacy and utility of NHPs for health-related research, increase the fecundity of genetically-valuable animals, and improve the ability to select for specific genetic characteristics when breeding NHPs.