Webinars

Jason completed his B.S. in Zoology at Michigan State University and a M.S. from Ohio State University. He received his Ph.D. from Purdue University, where his dissertation focused on oocyte metabolism and its effects on embryonic development in pigs and goats. After completing his Ph.D., Jason was a post-doctoral research fellow at the Cincinnati Zoo and Botanical Garden’s Center for Conservation and Research of Endangered Wildlife CREW where he began the development of a feline-specific culture medium and initiated research programs for black-footed cats and sand cats. Jason worked at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in the Dept. of Comparative Biosciences and at the Colorado Center for Reproductive Medicine before coming to Omaha’s Henry Doorly Zoo and Aquarium in 2016. Ongoing research projects include domestic cat oocyte maturation and embryo culture, collection of sperm from wild black-footed cats, investigating the effects of diet on sperm quality in cats, and sperm banking in tigers.

This webinar will present a microfluidic approach for culturing murine embryos in vitro. The technological challenges of introducing the microfluidic method in IVF protocols in laboratories and potential techniques to optimize the control of the microenvironment will be discussed.

Virginia Pensabene has a background in electronics and biomedical engineering. She focused on micro- and nanotechnologies as a postdoctoral researcher at the Center for Micro-BioRobotics of the Italian Institute of Technologies and the Vanderbilt Institute for Integrative Biosystems Research and Education. In 2017 she moved with a Marie Curie Fellowship from a research assistant professor position at Vanderbilt University to the University of Leeds, where she is now associate professor of electronics and biomedical engineering. After working as co-investigator for large US projects to design new organs-on-a-chip models and collaborating with world experts in reproduction and infectious diseases, she is now focused on innovative technologies to support fertility treatments and the identification of causes and origins of miscarriage and preterm birth. She has published in the main peer-reviewed journals in the field (36 papers, max cit. 372, h-index 21), established collaboration with colleagues in embryology and fertility, received International recognition, and attracted funding from NC3Rs, MRC, EU H2020, Grow Med Tech, and EPSRC. She set up her current research group, aiming to inspire PhD and MS students to creatively work with and translate ideas into entrepreneurial activities (five patents, scientific lead of IVFmicro, founder and CEO of WinMedical s.r.l.).

Porcine In Vitro Embryo Production: Current Progress and Future Prospects.

Attendees were invited to participate with Jennifer Barfield in an interactive educational webinar on embryo grading, hosted by the IETS Foundation. The webinar covered IVP and IVD embryos.