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Maternal immune modulation prior to embryo arrival in the uterus is important for establishment of pregnancy in cattle.

C. Gifford,Bahaa H Aloqaily,J. H. Gifford

Published 2019 in Journal of Animal Science

ABSTRACT

In 1953, Sir Peter Medawar first recognized the allogeneic properties of a developing conceptus and rationalized that an "immune tolerant" physiological state must exist during pregnancy. Early theories speculated that the conceptus evaded the maternal immune system completely, but 40 years after Medawar's observations, Wegmann proposed that the maternal immune system shifts the cytokine profile away from inflammatory cytokine production when an embryo is present. The economic consequences and production losses of subfertile animals has been well documented in studies evaluating calving distribution. Despite advances in understanding infertility or subfertility, few technologies exist to identify subfertile animals or improve fertility beyond hormonal intervention associated with synchronization protocols. Work in rodents and in some livestock species indicates that the uterine immune cell population shifts dramatically after copulation and these early immune modulated events establish a receptive uterine environment. Clearly, as evident in embryo transfer, the presence of a conceptus is sufficient to establish communication for pregnancy establishment but does not rule out the importance of other physiological events to prime the maternal immune system prior to blastocyst arrival in the uterus. In support of this concept, work in our laboratory and by others has demonstrated that autologous intrauterine transfer of peripheral immune cells prior to embryo transfer can increase pregnancy rates and accelerate conceptus development in women and cattle. Understanding aberrant immune regulation in subfertile animals may provide markers for subfertility or targets for clinical intervention to enhance fertility, particularly when utilizing reproductive technologies.

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