The physiological status of the ovarian donor affects the in-vitro development of isolated bovine preantral follicles

Described in the present paper is the effect of the physiological status of the ovarian donor on the development of isolated bovine preantral follicles during 5 d of culture. The preantral follicles were isolated mechanically from ovaries of calves, or nonpregnant, pregnant and postpartum cows collected at the slaughterhouse. There were no differences observed among calves, nonpregnant and pregnant cows, neither in the percentages of morphologically normal follicles, nor in the mean diameter increase during culture. However, preantral follicles isolated from postpartum animals had a lower viability during culture, as demonstrated by significantly lower percentages of morphologically normal and growing follicles as well as by a levier mean diameter increase. Our findings show that the ovarian source may affect development of bovine preantral follicles in vitro, especially when preantral follicles from postpartum cows were used.