A study on early human embryo jointly conducted by research teams led by Chen Zijiang, a professor of Center for Reproductive Medicine at Shandong University and an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and led by Professor Jie Wei of Tsinghua University has been selected as the "China's Top 10 Advances in Life Sciences" in 2022.

The study was published by Science on October 7, 2022. The research teams integrated ultra-low-input ribosome profiling (Ribo-lite) with messenger RNA sequencing to co-profile the translatome and transcriptome in human oocytes and early embryos.

The study says that translatome and transcriptome co-profiling reveals a role of TPRXs in human zygotic genome activation. Translational regulation plays a critical role during the oocyte-to-embryo transition (OET) and zygotic genome activation (ZGA), according to the study.

The findings provide an important theoretical basis and research tool for the treatment of infertility and the improvement of assisted reproductive technology in the future, experts said.

"China's Top 10 Advances in Life Sciences" were selected by senior experts in the fields of life sciences, biotechnology and clinical medicine, and reviewed and finalized by the presidium of the China Union of Life Science Societies.