Abstract
Glucose incorporation and utilization in mouse embryos increases during preimplantation development, which may depend on the amount of glucose transporter in the embryos. A reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) was used to study the expression of glucose transporter GLUT1 mRNA in preimplantation mouse embryos. Messenger RNA was obtained from 100 of 2-cell embryos and blastocysts using the Micro-Fast Track mRNA isolation kit. RT-PCR revealed that GLUT1 mRNA is expressed in both the 2-cell embryos and blastocysts. The levels of GLUT1 mRNA increased during embryonic development. These results suggest that glucose incorporation or the switch in the substrate preference of the embryo from pyruvate to glucose during preimplantation development depends at least in part on the expression of GLUT1 at the transcription level, which results in increased amounts of GLUT1 protein.
