Measures of maternal-fetal interaction in day-30 bovine pregnancies derived from nuclear transfer.

Embryonic mortality and abnormal placental morphology have been reported by most researchers studying nuclear transfer (NT), and it now is accepted that placental anomalies and poor development of cloned embryos are related. As early as day 50 of gestation, cloned bovine concepti exhibit poor structural organization of the developing placentomes. These experiments were designed to identify alterations in maternal-fetal interactions during establishment of the placentas of NT-derived embryos at day 30 of gestation. Bovine NT embryos were produced using cultured fibroblast cells from a single Hereford donor cow, and control embryos were derived from in vitro fertilization (IVF). Following in vivo culture in ligated sheep oviducts, day-8 blastocysts were transferred to synchronized recipient heifers. Tissues recovered from viable day-30 pregnancies were analyzed by real-time RT-PCR, immunohistochemistry, and quantitative histological techniques. Immunoperoxidase staining of caruncular tissue from NT- and IVF-derived pregnancies revealed no significant differences in expression of the extracellular matrix proteins, collagen type IV and laminin, or the receptor subunits, integrins alpha1 and alpha3, suggesting that altered expression of these proteins at day 30 of gestation is not a primary cause of abnormal placentome structure in cloned concepti. Percentage of binucleate cells (BNC) within the trophoblast also was similar in NT- and IVF-derived pregnancies; however, expression of the BNC-specific placental lactogen (PL) transcript was elevated in NT-derived concepti (p < 0.05). These results indicate that regulation of PL transcription was altered in cloned day-30 placental tissues, suggesting the presence of irregular fetal-maternal signaling patterns that might undermine continued development of NT-derived concepti.