MicroRNAs secreted by human preimplantation embryos and IVF outcome

Abstract Objective To generate an effective embryo prediction model and identify a non-invasive evaluation method by analyzing microRNAs (miRNAs) in embryo culture medium. Design Analysis of microRNA profiles from spent culture medium of blastocysts with good morphology that did or did not result in pregnancy. Setting Clinical and experimental research. Patients Sixty patients who underwent thawed embryo transfer of blastocysts after intracytoplasmic sperm injection. Intervention(s) None. Main outcome measure(s) The association of miRNA abundance levels secreted by blastocysts in culture medium and implantation success. Results Our RNA sequencing analysis found a total of 53 differentially expressed miRNAs in the culture media of pregnancy and non-pregnancy groups. Twenty-one miRNAs were analyzed for their potential to predict implantation success. Eight miRNAs (hsa-miR-191-5p, hsa-miR-320a, hsa-miR-92a-3p, hsa-miR-509-3p, hsa-miR-378a-3p, hsa-miR-28-3p, hsa-miR-512-5p, and hsa-miR-181a-5p) were further extracted from the results of a logistic regression analysis of qPCR Ct values. A prediction model for high-quality blastocysts was generated using the eight miRNAs, with an average accuracy of 0.82 by 5-fold cross validation. Conclusion We isolated blastocyst miRNAs that may predict implantation success and created a model to predict viable embryos. Increasing the number of investigated cases and further studying the effect of each miRNA on embryonic development is needed to refine the miRNA-based predictive model.