CONICET | Buscador de Institutos y Recursos Humanos

First trimester events associated to implantation are crucial for pregnancy success. Defects in these processes have been associated to the onset of many obstetric pathologies. In particularly, failure in vascular remodeling at the maternal-fetal interface affects blood supply to the fetus and increases maternal blood pressure. Therefore, it has been correlated with preeclampsia and intrauterine growth restriction.Maternal lifestyle affects the development of pregnancy. Therapies oriented to reduce stress and physical activity have shown to improve pregnancy outcome. Furthermore, stress during gestation is associated with preeclampsia, which is linked to defective vascular remodeling at the early placenta. We have previously demonstrated that female mice exposed preconceptionally and during gestation to an enriched environment (EE) present higher reproductive efficiency in day 15 of gestation, compared to females maintained in control environment (CE) (80% vs 40%). Based on these antecedents, we hypothesized that the EE regulates crucial events at early gestation that finally impact in the reproductive efficiency. Therefore, the aim of the present study was to investigate if EE exposure regulates vascular remodeling at the maternal-fetal interface.Six week old female mice were housed in EE or CE cages for six weeks, and then mated with CE fertile males. The EE strategy combines non-invasive stimulus of the sensory pathway with voluntary physical activity. Pregnant mice were sacrificed on day 7 of gestation (d7). In one group of animals, we collected the implantation sites to perform PCR, western blot and histological studies. In another group of females, the uterine arteries were clamped after sacrifice, and the uterine horns and the associated vasculature were extracted. Results: We found an increase in the uterine artery cross length in EE females compared to CE females (p