{"doi":"10.1111/rda.13035","title":"Differential effects of follistatin on porcine oocyte competence and cumulus cell gene expression in vitro","abstract":"<jats:title>Contents</jats:title><jats:p>Several oocyte‐derived genes/proteins are essential to early embryonic development. The expression and stability of these proteins are influenced by the autocrine/paracrine activity of factors released by oocytes and cumulus cells. This study investigated the paracrine and autocrine activity of follistatin (<jats:styled-content style=\"fixed-case\">FS</jats:styled-content>), which is secreted by oocytes and cumulus cells as part of porcine embryogenesis. Immunohistochemical (<jats:styled-content style=\"fixed-case\">IHC</jats:styled-content>) localization of follistatin was conducted on 100 randomly selected early‐ and late‐cleaving two‐cell embryos. Dissociated cumulus cells were treated with various doses of follistatin for determination of the follistatin gene (<jats:italic><jats:styled-content style=\"fixed-case\">FST</jats:styled-content></jats:italic>) <jats:styled-content style=\"fixed-case\">mRNA</jats:styled-content> expression levels by quantitative real‐time PCR analysis. Microinjection of si<jats:styled-content style=\"fixed-case\">RNA</jats:styled-content> induced a downregulation of <jats:italic><jats:styled-content style=\"fixed-case\">FST</jats:styled-content></jats:italic> <jats:styled-content style=\"fixed-case\">mRNA</jats:styled-content> during embryonic development, thereby decreasing the proportion embryos developing to the blastocyst stage (19.33%). Immunolocalization analysis showed enhanced staining for follistatin in early‐cleavage stage embryos. Quantitative real‐time <jats:styled-content style=\"fixed-case\">PCR</jats:styled-content> indicated a significantly lower <jats:italic><jats:styled-content style=\"fixed-case\">FST</jats:styled-content></jats:italic> transcript level in cumulus cells after application of the highest dose of follistatin (100 ng/ml). Exogenous follistatin treatment of in vitro maturation embryos resulted in statistically significant dose‐dependent changes during development. Application of the highest concentration (100 ng/ml) of follistatin decreased the maturation rate of the oocytes. On the other hand, the application of 10 ng/ml follistatin resulted in an increase in the number of embryos. The observed differential effect of exogenous follistatin might be due to maternal <jats:italic><jats:styled-content style=\"fixed-case\">FST</jats:styled-content></jats:italic> and autocrine/paracrine factors secreted by cumulus cells.</jats:p>","journal":"Reproduction in Domestic Animals","year":2018,"id":30028,"datarank":0.4478129062341204,"base_score":2.302585092994046,"endowment":2.302585092994046,"self_citation_contribution":0.3453877639491069,"citation_network_contribution":0.10242514228501351,"self_endowment_contribution":0.3453877639491069,"citer_contribution":0.10242514228501351,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":9,"citer_count":4,"citers_with_citation_signal":3,"citers_with_endowment":3,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":null,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":false,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":null,"fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":164130,"name":"MS Islam","orcid":null,"position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":164132,"name":"D Liu","orcid":null,"position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":53438,"name":"G Liu","orcid":null,"position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":164133,"name":"L Lv","orcid":null,"position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":164134,"name":"Y Yang","orcid":null,"position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":164135,"name":"B Fu","orcid":null,"position":6,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":164136,"name":"L Wang","orcid":null,"position":7,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":164137,"name":"Z Liu","orcid":null,"position":8,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":164138,"name":"H He","orcid":null,"position":9,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":53488,"name":"H Wu","orcid":null,"position":10,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":164129,"name":"Z Guo","orcid":"0000-0003-0592-5988","position":0,"is_corresponding":false}],"reference_count":0,"raw_metadata":{"has_enrichment":true,"base_score":2.302585092994046,"endowment":2.302585092994046,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"views":0,"has_version_chain":false,"is_dataset":false,"is_oa":false,"pmid":"29134682","pmcid":null,"openalex_id":"https://openalex.org/W2768433320","authors":[],"funders":[{"funder_name":"Natural Science Foundation of Heilongjiang Province","grant_id":"LC2013C08","title":null}],"total_grants":1,"fwci":0.7503,"citation_percentile":0.78185517,"influential_citations":0,"citation_trend":[{"year":2020,"count":3},{"year":2021,"count":1},{"year":2022,"count":1},{"year":2023,"count":2},{"year":2024,"count":1},{"year":2026,"count":1}],"oa_status":"closed","license":"http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/termsAndConditions#vor","oa_locations":[{"url":"https://api.wiley.com/onlinelibrary/tdm/v1/articles/10.1111%2Frda.13035","host_type":"publisher"},{"url":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/rda.13035","host_type":"publisher"},{"url":"https://doi.org/10.1111/rda.13035","host_type":"journal"},{"url":"https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29134682","host_type":"repository"}],"fields_of_study":["Reproductive Biology and Fertility","Animal Genetics and Reproduction","Genetic Mapping and Diversity in Plants and Animals","Medicine","Biology","Animals","Autocrine Communication","Blastocyst","Cumulus Cells","Embryonic Development","Female","Follistatin","Gene Expression","Gene Silencing","In Vitro Oocyte Maturation Techniques","Oocytes","Paracrine Communication","RNA, Messenger","Real-Time Polymerase Chain Reaction","Swine"],"mesh_terms":["Animals","Blastocyst","Female","Oocytes","RNA, Messenger","Swine","Gene Expression","Autocrine Communication","Paracrine Communication","Gene Silencing","Follistatin","Embryonic Development","Cumulus Cells","In Vitro Oocyte Maturation Techniques","Real-Time Polymerase Chain Reaction"],"keywords":["Follistatin","Autocrine signalling","Paracrine signalling","Blastocyst","Oocyte","Biology","Embryo","Andrology","Embryogenesis","Messenger RNA","Gene expression","Endocrinology","Embryonic stem cell","Internal medicine","Cell biology","Cell culture","Gene","Receptor","Medicine","Genetics","Swine","Cumulus-oocyte complexes","Parthenogenetic Sirna Induced A Downregulation"],"sdg_mappings":[],"linked_datasets":[],"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"database_accessions":[],"source":"live","citation_network_status":"fetched"},"created_at":"2026-06-09T01:39:42.004029Z","pmid":null,"pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}