Faculty Members Supervise Fertility Study Published in Prestigious Reproductive Journal
Recently, a research team from Mount Sinai Fertility published their study “Cargo small non-coding RNAs of extracellular vesicles isolated from uterine fluid associate with endometrial receptivity and implantation success” in Fertility and Sterility, one of the most impactful journals in reproductive medicine. The study was completed by the postdoctoral fellow Dr. Tiantian Li from Lunenfeld-Tanenbaum Research Institute, under the supervision of Dr. Ellen Greenblatt, Professor, and Dr. Crystal Chan, Assistant Professor, with the Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, with further assistance from Dr. Ted Brown, Professor, and Michelle EyunJung Shin, Mount Sinai Fertility.
The research team received $40,000 as the funding support from the American Society of Reproductive Medicine to fulfill the scientific objectives. In this work, they for the first time comprehensively profiled small non-coding RNAs (sncRNAs) in endometrial extracellular vesicles (EVs) from human uterine fluid of both healthy volunteers and women receiving in vitro fertilization (IVF) treatment. They identified a small cohort of EV-sncRNAs associated strongly with immune response, extracellular matrix, and cell junction as novel and conserved biomarkers of endometrial receptivity. The study also suggested that implantation failure in IVF might be associated with dysregulation of endometrial EV-sncRNAs.
"The study is important because it extends our knowledge of endometrial receptivity, a conception that refers to a temporal, spatial and molecular state of the endometrium conducive to embryo implantation, which is a pre-requisite for the successful pregnancy," said Dr. Li. "Endometrial EVs are thought to be a messenger for endometrial-embryonic interactions at implantation. A better characterization of the RNA contents in endometrial EVs contributes to our understanding of mechanisms involved in preparing the endometrium for implantation. In the future, findings from this study may form the basis of developing minimally invasive receptivity test utilizing endometrial EVs to improve prediction of implantation in IVF. The study result will also provide a wider clinical implication of developing therapeutic analogues of EV-sncRNAs for fine tuning of endometrial function."
Congratulations to the team!
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