Assisted Reproductive Technologies (ART) With Baboons Generate Live Offspring: A Nonhuman Primate Model for ART and Reproductive Sciences

Human reproduction has benefited significantly by investigating non-human primate (NHP) models, especially rhesus macaques. To expand the Old World monkey species available for human reproductive studies, we present protocols in baboons, our closest Old World primate relatives, for Assisted Reproductive Technologies (ART) leading to live-born offspring. Baboons complement rhesus by confirming or modifying observations generated in humans often obtained by the study of clinically-discarded specimens donated by anonymous infertility patient-couples. Here, baboon ART protocols, including oocyte collection, in vitro fertilization, intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI), preimplantation development to blastocyst stage and embryo transfer techniques are described. With baboon ART methodologies in place, motility during baboon fertilization was investigated by time-lapse video microscopy. The first ART baboons produced by ICSI, a pair of male twins, were delivered naturally at 165 days post-gestation. Genetic testing of these twins confirmed their ART parental origins and demonstrated that they are unrelated fraternal twins, not identicals. These results have implications for ART outcomes, embryonic stem cell derivation, and reproductive sciences.