Thinking big by thinking small: application of microfluidic technology to improve ART

Abstract

In Vitro Fertilization (IVF) laboratories often carry a penchant to resist change while in the pursuit of maintaining consistency in laboratory conditions. However, implementation of new technology is often critical to expand scientific discoveries and to improve upon prior successes to advance the field. Microfluidic platforms represent a technology that has the potential to revolutionize the fundamental processes of IVF. While the focus of microfluidic application in IVF has centered on embryo culture, the innovative platforms carry tremendous potential to improve other procedural steps and represents a possible paradigm shift in how we handle gametes and embryos. The following review will highlight application of various microfluidic platforms in IVF for use in maturation, manipulation, culture, cryopreservation and non-invasive quality assessment; pointing out new insights gained into functions of sperm, oocytes and embryos. Platform design and function will also be discussed, focusing on limitations, advancements and future refinements that can further aid in their clinical implementation.

Noninferiority, randomized, controlled trial comparing embryo development using media developed for sequential or undisturbed culture in a time-lapse setup

“…One can envision that other techniques could be adopted in the future, for instance, a device that can perform a gradual in situ change of the medium over time. Such a device might even be used to perform analysis of the media (20,21). A current alternative strategy, however, is to culture the embryo in a single medium that has been optimized to cover the metabolic needs of both early and late-stage embryos during culture.…”

Application of microfluidic technologies to human assisted reproduction

“…Collectively, these experiments using mouse embryos document that microfluidics can be used for preimplantation embryo culture, they provide experimental power in precise regulation of culture environment and informative data on embryo development, and provided benefits for embryo development. There have been numerous reviews discussing the future of microfluidics for domestic animal and human assisted reproduction (Krisher and Wheeler, 2010;Meseguer et al, 2012;Swain et al, 2013). Kieslinger et al (2015) have demonstrated that human embryos can be grown in microfluidic devices, yet to our knowledge, no peer-reviewed published manuscript currently exist demonstrating a benefit of microfluidic embryo culture with human embryos.…”

Recent advances in microfluidic diagnostic and treatment systems for assisted reproductive technologies in developing countries

“…Among LOC devices, microfluidic sperm sorting (MFSS) chips have been developed and marketed for motile sperm sorting and use two gravity-driven laminar flows across a microfluidic channel of 50-200 µm [52][53][54][55][56][57][58][59][60][61]. Fluids flowing through the semen inlet (A) and the medium inlet (B) move parallel to each other and exit through respective outlets (A→D and B→C) [53].…”

“…Among LOC devices, microfluidic sperm sorting (MFSS) chips have been developed and marketed for motile sperm sorting and use two gravity-driven laminar flows across a microfluidic channel of 50-200 µm [52][53][54][55][56][57][58][59][60][61]. Fluids flowing through the semen inlet (A) and the medium inlet (B) move parallel to each other and exit through respective outlets (A→D and B→C) [53]. Sperm are then sorted on the basis of their ability to swim across the streamline into the medium stream, and only motile sperm are recovered from outlet C. Using MFSS devices, embryologists can perform a 1-step sorting protocol without centrifugation, and processing can be completed within 30 min [40,[57][58][59][60][61].…”