HIKE: Validating the measurement of respiration by mammalian embryos (HIKE)

Project Description

This project is the first step on a journey that has the potential to revolutionise treatment of human infertility. It will generate vital confidence-in-concept data to confirm that the validated and established “Resipher system” (see below) is able to measure metabolic function of early embryos. A major bottleneck in the success rates of clinical IVF is the limited tools available to select embryos with the highest chance of generating a pregnancy. Metabolic activity (the way in which the embryos generate energy to power development) has been shown to predict embryo viability in a range of settings. One important way of measuring embryo metabolism is to determine the rate of oxygen consumption, which is a marker of global metabolic energy production. However, despite a mature scientific foundation, translation of a metabolic biomarker into clinical practice has been impeded by the absence of a technology platform that has the translational potential for clinical IVF.

In the past few years, Lucid Scientific, a US-based start-up have developed the world’s first hand-held cell culture system for the monitoring of oxygen consumption by cells in culture - the Resipher system. The system was developed as a research tool to enable the simple, cost-effective and reliable determination of metabolic function of cells in culture, significantly enhancing research in energy metabolism. To date, Lucid Scientific have distribution agreements across the United States, the UK and Europe. The Resipher is a highly accurate and user-friendly system that uses conventional cell culture consumables, meaning that it has the potential to meet many of the regulatory requirements for eventual translation into IVF settings across the world. However, to date, there has been no confirmation that Resipher is capable of measuring oxygen consumption by mammalian embryos. This project will gather vital confidence-in-concept data on whether this exciting technology has the ultimate potential for application in a clinical IVF setting. This would open a new lucrative global market for Lucid Scientific as well as supporting underpinning high impact translational research, ultimately with the potential to lead to a step-change in clinical IVF across the world.