Differential gene expression during porcine conceptus trophoblastic elongation and attachment to the uterine epithelium. Sus scrofa

The objective of the present investigation was to utilize the GeneChip® Porcine Genome Array from Affymetrix possessing 20, 201 unique probe sets to identify differentially expressed genes during rapid trophoblastic elongation and attachment to the uterine surface in the pig. Identification and characterization of conceptus gene expression patterns during rapid trophoblastic elongation and attachment in the pig will provide a better understanding of the events required for successful implantation and embryonic survival. Overall design: Four chips were used for each morphological stage of development (spherical, tubular, Day 12 filamentous and Day 14 filamentous). RNA utilized for each chip represented a unique pool of conceptus total RNA for the respective morphological stage of development. Prior to target labeling, RNA was further purified (RNeasy MinElute Cleanup, Qiagen, Valencia, CA). Target labeling, GeneChip® hybridization, scanning and quantification were conducted by The University of Tulsa Microarray Core Facility. Affymetrix GeneChip Operating Software (GCOS version 1.1.1, Affymetrix, Santa Clara, CA) was used to quantitate each GeneChip®. The summary intensities for each probe were loaded into DNA-Chip Analyzer (dChip), version 1.3 for normalization, standardization, and analysis.