Deterioration without replenishment--the misery of oocyte cohesin.

Humans suffer a steep increase in aneuploidies when oocytes age, and deterioration of cohesin was suggested recently as a prominent cause. In the November 15, 2010, issue of Genes & Development, Tachibana-Konwalski and colleagues (pp. 2505-2516) answered a question central to this hypothesis: Can cohesin be reloaded onto mouse oocyte chromosomes long after birth? They found that it cannot, or at least not with an efficiency adequate to rescue cohesin deficiency. With no chance for sufficient replenishment, age-related loss of sister chromatid cohesion seems unavoidable.