About the Authors

Anna Sophia Leps

Roles Data curation, Formal analysis, Investigation, Methodology, Resources, Validation, Visualization, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Unit for Reproductive Medicine – Clinic for Small Animals, University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover, Foundation, Hannover, Germany

Eva-Maria Packeiser

Roles Methodology, Validation, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Unit for Reproductive Medicine – Clinic for Small Animals, University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover, Foundation, Hannover, Germany

Christina Schwens

Roles Data curation, Investigation, Methodology, Resources, Validation, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Antech Lab Germany GmbH, Augsburg, Germany

Benjamin Stoelcker

Roles Data curation, Investigation, Methodology, Resources, Validation, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Antech Lab Germany GmbH, Augsburg, Germany

Semir Doric

Roles Data curation, Investigation, Methodology, Resources, Validation, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing

Affiliation SYNLAB MVZ Weiden GmbH, Dept. of Molecular Biology, Weiden, Germany

Martina Wirkner

Roles Investigation, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing

Affiliation SYNLAB MVZ Weiden GmbH, Dept. of Molecular Biology, Weiden, Germany

Beate Walter

Roles Data curation, Investigation, Resources, Validation, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Clinic of Small Animal Surgery and Reproduction at the Centre for Clinical Veterinary Medicine, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, LMU Munich, Germany

Axel Wehrend

Roles Investigation, Resources, Validation, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Veterinary Clinic for Reproductive Medicine and Neonatology, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Justus-Liebig-University, Giessen, Germany

Viktoria Kichmann

Roles Data curation, Investigation, Resources, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Veterinary Clinic for Reproductive Medicine and Neonatology, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Justus-Liebig-University, Giessen, Germany

Klaus Jung

Roles Formal analysis, Investigation, Methodology, Resources, Software, Validation, Visualization, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Institute for Animal Genomics, University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover, Foundation, Hannover, Germany

Sandra Goericke-Pesch

Roles Conceptualization, Funding acquisition, Investigation, Methodology, Project administration, Resources, Supervision, Validation, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing

Sandra.Goericke-Pesch@tiho-hannover.de

Affiliation Unit for Reproductive Medicine – Clinic for Small Animals, University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover, Foundation, Hannover, Germany

Competing Interests

I have read the journal's policy and the authors of this manuscript have the following competing interests: Christina Schwens and Benjamin Stoelcker are employees of the Antech Lab Germany GmbH, Semir Doric and Martina Wirkner are employees of SYNLAB MVZ Weiden GmbH. This does not alter our adherence to PLOS ONE policies on sharing data and material.