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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Endocrinol.
Sec. Reproduction
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fendo.2025.1483893
This article is part of the Research Topic Lifestyle and Environmental Factors and Human Fertility View all 9 articles

Maternal environmental enrichment affects the corpora lutea and progesterone levels in pregnant mice

Provisionally accepted
Fernanda Luz De la Cruz Borthiry Fernanda Luz De la Cruz Borthiry 1Jimena Soledad Beltrame Jimena Soledad Beltrame 1Julieta Aylen Schander Julieta Aylen Schander 1Aime Silva Aime Silva 1Fernanda Parborell Fernanda Parborell 2Ana María Franchi Ana María Franchi 1María Laura Ribeiro María Laura Ribeiro 1*
  • 1 Laboratorio de Fisio-Patología Ovárica, Centro de Estudios Farmacológicos y Botánicos, Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas, Buenos Aires,, Argentina
  • 2 Laboratory for Studies of Ovarian Physiopathology, CONICET Institute of Medicine and Experimental Biology of Cuyo (IMBECU), Buenos Aires, Buenos Aires, Argentina

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Maternal lifestyle impacts reproductive performance. Previously, we demonstrated that maternal environmental enrichment promotes pregnancy success in BALB/c mice. As progesterone regulates gestation, we decided to study the effect of maternal environmental enrichment on ovarian physiology during early gestation. For this, six-week-old female mice were housed in enriched or control cages for six weeks and then mated with control fertile males. Females with a mucus plug were returned to their respective control or enriched cages. Pregnant mice were euthanized on day 7 of pregnancy, and ovaries and progesterone levels were investigated. Hematoxylin and eosin slices showed no differences in the area (µm 2 ) of the ovaries between control and enriched females. Also, the number of primordial, primary, preantral, antral, and atretic follicles was similar for both treatments. However, the number and area (µm 2 ) of corpora lutea were increased in the ovaries from the enriched group. Moreover, enriched females presented higher progesterone serum levels and increased 3β-HSD expression. Therefore, maternal environmental enrichment regulates ovarian physiology, and this could promote the benefits previously reported.

    Keywords: Maternal enriched environment, gestation, Ovary, Progesterone, Corpora lutea

    Received: 20 Aug 2024; Accepted: 23 Jan 2025.

    Copyright: © 2025 De la Cruz Borthiry, Beltrame, Schander, Silva, Parborell, Franchi and Ribeiro. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: María Laura Ribeiro, Laboratorio de Fisio-Patología Ovárica, Centro de Estudios Farmacológicos y Botánicos, Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas, Buenos Aires,, Argentina

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