Fig. 1.

Effect of cryopreservation and the addition of pharmacological inhibitors of the PI3K/PTEN/Akt and mTOR signalling pathways during cryopreservation on follicle activation. Ratio of phosphorylated to total protein forms of Akt (A) and rps6 (B). C Addition of inhibitors to cryopreservation media. SF = slow-frozen/thawed ovaries with or without inhibitors: CT = control; LY = LY294002; Ra = rapamycin. Ovaries from C57Bl/6 and Nu/Nu mice, 4 weeks old. a significant difference compared to the corresponding CT. Numbers in columns represent the number of ovaries analysed per group. 3–5 experimental replicates were performed. *p ≤ 0.05, ****p ≤ 0.0001