NEW HAVEN, Conn., June 4 (UPI) -- U.S. and U.K. researchers say
they identified the chromosomal makeup of a human egg that may
make it possible to avoid abnormal eggs in in vitro
fertilization. Dr. Pasquale Patrizio, director of the Yale
Fertility Center director, and Dagan Wells of the University of
Oxford in England, said the discovery might soon allow them to
avoid using abnormal -- or aneuploid -- eggs during infertility
treatments. It would allow for the picking of eggs that are
healthy enough for a successful in vitro fertilization cycle,
the researchers said. Only a few oocytes -- eggs -- per IVF
treatment cycle are able to produce a pregnancy because many
eggs have the wrong number of chromosomes. If the egg is missing
a chromosome or has an extra chromosome, this is referred to as
aneuploidy. This problem increases as women age, Patrizio said.
Oocytes are surrounded by cumulus cells, which regulate and
assist the process of egg maturation. In this study, Patrizio
and Wells of the University of Oxford