Embryo quality of mice (“Mus musculus”) fed royal jelly

Abstract

The study was carried out to verify the effect of feeding royal jelly associated to follicle growth induction on number and quality of mice (Mus musculus) embryos. Sixty Swiss females ageing from eight to ten weeks were distributed into three treatments: the first one, composed by animals fed 0.2 mL of physiological solution intraperitoneal (control group, n=20); the second and third ones, composed by females fed 0.5 and 1.0 mg of royal jelly diluted in 0.2 mL of physiological solution (n=20), respectively. Royal jelly was administered during 15 days, followed by the follicular growth induction process. Embryos were collected 68 hours after mating, by uterine flushing. No treatment effects on the number of females that answered to superovulatory process, the number of total recovery structures, the number of viable and non viable structures and the morphological quality of viable embryos (P>0.05) were observed. Therefore, royal jelly doses used were not efficient to increase the number of embryos and to improve the quality recovery from superovulated mice.