Abstract
The functional unit within the ovary is the ovarian follicle, which is also a morphological unit composed of three basic cell types: the oocyte, granulosa, and theca cells. Similar to human ovarian follicles, mouse follicles can be isolated from their ovarian environment and cultured in vitro to study folliculogenesis, or follicle development for days or weeks. Over the course of the last decade, follicle culture in a three-dimensional (3D) environment exponentially improved the outcomes of in vitro folliculogenesis. Follicle culture in 3D environments preserves follicle architecture and promotes the cross talk between cells in the follicle. Hydrogels, such as polyethylene glycol (PEG), have been used for various physiological systems for regenerative purposes because they provide a 3D environment similar to soft tissues, allow diffusion of nutrients, and can be readily modified to present biological signals, including cell adhesion ligands and proteolytic degradation facilitated by enzymes secreted by the encapsulated cells. This chapter outlines the application of PEG hydrogels to the follicle culture, including the procedures to isolate, encapsulate, and culture mouse ovarian follicles. The tunable properties of PEG hydrogels support co-encapsulation of ovarian follicles with somatic cells, which further promote follicle survival and growth in vitro through paracrine and juxtacrine interactions.
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Acknowledgments
This work is supported by Reproductive Science Program (RSP) institutional funding (NIH U046944) from the University of Michigan to AS and the National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate Research Fellowship Program (GRFP) to UM.
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Mendez, U., Zhou, H., Shikanov, A. (2018). Synthetic PEG Hydrogel for Engineering the Environment of Ovarian Follicles. In: Chawla, K. (eds) Biomaterials for Tissue Engineering. Methods in Molecular Biology, vol 1758. Humana Press, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4939-7741-3_9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4939-7741-3_9
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