Research Projects

Early pregnancy losses in cattle significantly impact farm economics in India and abroad. Almost 50% of these losses occur during the window of blastocyst hatching to conceptus attachment to the endometrium. A conducive microenvironment is crucial for successful implantation, which requires a receptive endometrium, an implantation-competent conceptus, and synchronous communication between maternal and embryonic tissues. Pregnancy establishment requires adequate endometrial response to conceptus derived IFNT production, such as proliferation of endometrial epithelial cells, secretion of histotroph by glandular epithelial cells, and inhibition of luteolysis. Inhibition of corpus luteum (CL) degradation is important as it is the primary source of progesterone secretion throughout bovine pregnancy. To better understand early events associated with pregnancy loss in cattle, a better understanding of the interactions between endometrial epithelial cells and trophoectodermal cells is needed. Although there is a lot of information available on implantation during hemochorial placentation, systematic studies on ruminant implantation are very few. To further characterize early events associated with bovine conceptus implantation and identify regulators of pregnancy maintenance in cattle, an in vitro implantation model will be developed. The identified proteins expressed on cell membrane will be targeted by specific siRNA/shRNA in both cell lines to ascertain the role on target protein in mediating attachment in the in vitro model of implantation.