CHARACTERIZATION OF A MOUSE MODEL TO ANALYZE THE EFFECT OF HYPERCHOLESTEROLEMIA IN OVARIAN HISTOPHYSIOLOGY

RINALDINI, ESTEFANÍA; DE PAOLA, MARIA MATILDE; CASTRO, CLAUDIA; SAYHEG, FABIANA; MICHAUT, MARCELA ALEJANDRA

Estancia Grande, San Luis

Congreso; XXXII Reunión Anual de la Sociedad de Biología de Cuyo; 2014

Sociedad de Biología de Cuyo

In Argentina 3 out of 10 adults suffer hypercholesterolemia (HC), a disorder of lipoprotein metabolism caused by high levels of cholesterol in blood. It is known that HC inhibits fertility in mice and human, however it is unknown how HC affects female reproduction. Our aim was to characterize a mouse model to analyze the effect of HC in the ovarian histophysiology using the apolipoprotein E knock out (ApoE KO) mice, which have high levels of cholesterol in blood. Wild type (control) and ApoE KO (hypercholesterolemic) C57BL/6 female mice (6-8 weeks) were divided in control and diet groups. Diet groups received balanced fatty food and control groups received a standard diet during 2 months. At 4 months of age, mice were cycled and sacrificed on the afternoon of proestrus. Serum was collected by cardiac puncture for cholesterolemia determination and ovaries were fixed for histological analysis and quantification of primordial, primary and pre/antral follicles, and luteum corpus. We found that: 1) control group treated with diet (n=3), ApoE KO control (n=5) and ApoE KO diet (n=5) groups had significantly higher levels of total cholesterol than control group (n=3), 2) HC mice had a normal length of estrous cycle (4-5 days); 3) folliculogenesis was normal in all groups, 4) HC groups showed a higher rate of folicular maturation compared to control group. We conclude that HC alters ovarían histophysiology at reproductive age and that ApoE KO mouse is an excellent animal model for studying the effect of HC on female reproduction.