Oviduct epithelium interactions: roles in sperm selection and embryo quality

Saint-Dizier, Marie; Souza-Fabjan, Joanna Maria Gonçalves; Reynaud, Karine; Mermillod, Pascal; Almiñana, Carmen; Bauersachs, Stefan; Mahé, Coline

doi:10.1590/1984-3143-AR2025-0035

person Marie Saint-Dizier *

conceptualization · funding acquisition · supervision · writing · original draft · writing · review & editing

schoolInstitut National de Recherche pour l’agriculture, l’alimentation et l’environnement – INRAE, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique – CNRS, Université de Tours, Physiologie de la Reproduction et des Comportements, Nouzilly, France

0000-0002-4569-5665

person Joanna Maria Gonçalves Souza-Fabjan

funding acquisition · writing · review & editing

schoolFaculdade de Medicina Veterinária, Universidade Federal Fluminense – UFF, Niterói, RJ, Brasil

0000-0002-4872-1718

person Karine Reynaud

data curation · writing · review & editing

schoolInstitut National de Recherche pour l’agriculture, l’alimentation et l’environnement – INRAE, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique – CNRS, Université de Tours, Physiologie de la Reproduction et des Comportements, Nouzilly, France

0000-0002-8897-6790

person Pascal Mermillod

conceptualization · writing · original draft · writing · review & editing

schoolInstitut National de Recherche pour l’agriculture, l’alimentation et l’environnement – INRAE, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique – CNRS, Université de Tours, Physiologie de la Reproduction et des Comportements, Nouzilly, France

0000-0002-9836-2506

person Carmen Almiñana

funding acquisition · writing · original draft · writing · review & editing

schoolDepartment of Reproductive Endocrinology, University Hospital Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland

0000-0003-0495-7099

person Stefan Bauersachs

funding acquisition · supervision · writing · original draft · writing · review & editing

schoolInstitute of Veterinary Anatomy, Vetsuisse Faculty, University of Zurich, Lindau, Switzerland

0000-0003-2450-1216

person Coline Mahé

conceptualization · data curation · writing · original draft · writing · review & editing

schoolInstitut National de Recherche pour l’agriculture, l’alimentation et l’environnement – INRAE, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique – CNRS, Université de Tours, Physiologie de la Reproduction et des Comportements, Nouzilly, France

0009-0006-3460-1404

person*Corresponding author:marie.saint-dizier@univ-tours.fr

Conflicts of interest:

The authors have no conflict of interest to declare.

Academic Editors:

Carlos Eduardo Ambrósio, Felipe Perecin.

Species	In vitro oviduct model	Sperm preparation	Main result	Reference
Cattle	OEC monolayer from the whole oviduct of pubertal cows	Frozen-thawed and Percoll-gradient washed bull semen	Sperm bound to OEC and then released by heparin displayed higher ZP binding capacity and produced higher cleavage rates after IVF, compared with unbound and control sperm.	Gualtieri and Talevi (2003)
Cattle	OEC suspension from the whole oviduct of pubertal cows at post-ovulatory stage	Frozen-thawed and Percoll-gradient washed bull semen	Unbound free sperm displayed lower ZP binding capacity and produced less fertilized COCs or denuded oocytes, compared with a mix of bound and unbound sperm (control).	Kon et al. (2009)
Cattle	OEC monolayer from the whole oviduct of pubertal cows at peri-ovulatory stage	Frozen-thawed and Percoll-gradient washed bull semen	Sperm bound to OEC and then released by P4 produced higher cleavage and blastocyst rates after IVF, compared with controls without OEC	Lamy et al. (2017)
Cattle	Cell aggregates from isthmus of pubertal cows	Frozen-thawed bull semen pre-selected by swim up	Sperm bound to aggregates from isthmus produced higher cleavage rates on day 2 after IVF, compared with control sperm.	El-Sokary et al. (2022)
Pig	OEC monolayer	Fresh Percoll-gradient washed boar semen	Sperm pre-incubated with OEC produced higher rates of zygotes with two pronuclei and reduced polyspermy compared with controls without cells.	Bureau et al. (2000)
Pig	OEC monolayer from the whole oviduct of cycling gilts	Fresh Percoll-gradient washed boar semen	Sperm bound to OEC and then co-incubated with oocytes produced higher penetration rates and nuclear decondensation after IVF, compared with unbound sperm.	Lopez-Ubeda et al. (2017)
Pig	Oviduct glycans coupled to a glass surface	Fresh Percoll-gradient washed boar semen	Sperm bound to sulfated Lewis X trisaccharide and then released by COCs produced higher rates of monospermic zygotes, compared with control sperm with no pre-binding.	Soto-Heras et al. (2025)

	Cattle	Pig	Sheep	Goat	Horse	Rabbit	Human	Mice
Onset of major ZGA	8-cell	4-cell	8-16 cell	4-8 cell	8-cell	8-cell	4-cell	2-cell
Duration of stay in the oviduct (days)	3 - 4	≈ 2	3 - 4	4	5-6	2 - 3	3 – 3.5	3 – 3.5
Duration of stay in the oviduct (days)	3 - 4	≈ 2	3 - 4	2-2.5	5-6	2 - 3	3 – 3.5	3 – 3.5
Embryo stage on entering the uterus	8-16 cell	4-cell	8-16 cell	12-cell	Morula - blastocyst	Morula-blastocyst	12-16 cell	Blastocyst
References	(Betteridge, 1995; Gad et al., 2012)	(Tománek et al., 1989)	(Crosby et al., 1988; Betteridge, 1995)	(Betteridge, 1995; Deng et al., 2020)	(Betteridge, 1995; Goszczynski et al., 2022)	(Betteridge, 1995; Pacheco-Trigon et al., 2002)	(Betteridge, 1995; Jukam et al., 2017)	(Betteridge, 1995; Jukam et al., 2017)

[1] OEC: oviduct epithelial cells; ZP: zona pellucida; IVF: in vitro fertilization; COCs: cumulus-oocytes complexes.