Transforming growth factor beta-1 decreases the yield of the second meiotic division of rat pachytene spermatocytes in vitro

Table 3 Numbers of BrdU-labeled PS, of BrdU-labeled secondary spermatocytes (SII) and BrdU-labeled RS on day 1 and day 3 of coculture of BrdU-labeled PS/diplotene spermatocytes of stages VII-XIII and Sertoli cells in the absence or presence of TGFβ1

	Number of PS/mm			Number of SII/mm			Number of RS/mm			Number of metaphases
Days of culture	-		+	-		+	-		+	-		+
1 (n = 3)	67.6 ± 14.5	NS	63.9 ± 17.4	1.3 ± 0.3	NS	1.7 ± 0.3	0.1 ± 0.1	NS	0.1 ± 0.1	0	NS	0
3 (n = 7)	42.7 ± 5.1	NS	33.4 ± 6.1	4.1 ± 0.8	NS	3.8 ± 0. 9	5.7 ± 1.3	p < 0.05	4.2 ± 1.3	1.3 ± 0.2	NS	1.8 ± 0.3

BrdU-labeled PS/diplotene spermatocytes were cocultured for 3 days in the absence (-) or presence (+) of 10 ng/ml TGFβ1. On days 1 and 3, the numbers of BrdU-labeled PS, BrdU-labeled SII, BrdU-labeled RS and BrdU-labeled metaphases were determined by microscopic examination of the culture wells and expressed as the number of each cell type per mm of well and on the width of the microscope field (objective × 100). About 500 BrdU-labeled cells were counted in each condition and in each experiment.
Each value is the mean ± SEM ; n : number of experiments.
NS : not significant.

ISSN: 1477-7827