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CoQ10 and oocyte quality

A study in mice: CoQ10 can slow the ageing of the cells that nurse the egg

Dr. Patsama VichinsartvichaiMClinEmbryol, EFOG-EBCOG, EFRM-ESHRE/EBCOG.

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Following on from what I have said before about supplements for women and about antioxidants — this one has just been published. It is on the effect of giving CoQ10 on the quality of the cells that nurse the egg (cumulus cells).

The study compared three groups

  1. Young mice
  2. Older mice
  3. Older mice given CoQ10

Then they assessed what the cumulus cells were like after CoQ10 — at a dose that had already been tested and found to raise the CoQ10 concentration in the ovary threefold.

What they found

  1. The number of cumulus cells per egg was higher in the young mice and in the older mice given CoQ10 than in the older mice that did not get it.
  2. Death from degeneration in the older mice given CoQ10 was as low as in the young mice — and of course lower than in the older mice without it (judged from the level of the enzyme caspase-3).
  3. DNA damage in the older mice given CoQ10 sat at much the same level as in the young mice, and lower than in the older mice without it (seen on TUNEL staining).
  4. How well the cumulus cells worked — judged from the number of mitochondria, how much glucose they took up, and how much progesterone they made — came out at much the same level in the young mice and in the older mice given CoQ10, and pointed in a better direction than in the older mice that did not receive CoQ10.
Three charts from the CoQ10 paper comparing young mice, older mice, and older mice given CoQ10
Charts from the paper Co-Enzyme Q10 Supplementation Rescues Cumulus Cells Dysfunction in a Maternal Aging Model (2019), with Thai notes written over them. Chart A is the number of cumulus cells per egg; chart B is TUNEL staining, which shows DNA damage inside the cell; chart C is caspase-3 activity, which marks cell death. Each chart sets young mice (Young) against older mice (Old) and older mice given CoQ10 (Old/CoQ10). Below the charts are microscope images of the cells.
The p-values printed on the three charts above
ChartWhat it measuresYoung vs OldOld vs Old/CoQ10Young vs Old/CoQ10
ACumulus cells per eggp<0.001p=0.02p=0.04
BTUNEL staining — DNA damagep<0.03p<0.001p=NS
CCleaved caspase-3 — cell deathp<0.001p<0.001p=NS

In short

In mice, a CoQ10 supplement can slow the ageing of the cumulus cells. In people, the data are as I have laid out before — taking it is better than not taking it.

If you want to read the paper

The paper is Co-Enzyme Q10 Supplementation Rescues Cumulus Cells Dysfunction in a Maternal Aging Model (2019); the authors are the ones listed in the image above. The full text is at academia.edu.

With my best wishes — Dr. Patsama

  • CoQ10
  • Egg quality
  • cumulus cells
  • antioxidants
  • Supplements
  • DNA damage
  • Cell death
  • Mouse study