The overarching goal of the current studies is to identify novel targets for contraception in the mammalian ovary using an unbiased approach that interrogates the proteomes of staged ovarian follicular cells (both germ cells and somatic cells). To do this, however, we require a more intimate understanding of the proteomic changes that take place in the transition from resting oocyte within a primordial follicle, to actively growing oocyte within later stage oocytes, and finally to large, activated oocyte within pre-ovulatory antral follicle. Once identified novel and/or biologically interesting proteins will be compiled into a list and prioritized for further analysis based on druggability and function with consultation across the NHC Ecosystem. The most promising of these will proceed towards our second objective, namely to establish suitable methods to ablate the function of a given protein or protein network at a specific time in oocyte development to explore the impact on ovulation and oocyte viability. 

With all this in mind, the aims of the current proposed research are two-fold:
1. To dissect the dynamic ovarian proteome spanning dictyate arrest of resting ovarian follicles through to ovulation in mouse and human.

2. To develop and utilize in vivo and ex vivo platforms for assessing candidate ovarian targets, based on ongoing development and proof-of-principle studies using two distinct methods: a. The Cas13d pipeline for reversible depletion of key oocyte/follicular mRNA targets for assessing contraceptive efficacy. b. The Trim Away method to deplete mouse and human oocytes of vital protein components in follicular cultures using antibodies that have been filtered through the YCharOS-Repro platform.