Women's menstrual cycles are carefully controlled by endocrine, autocrine, and paracrine factors that regulate

ovarian follicular development, ovulation, luteinisation, luteolysis, and endometrial remodeling. While core
reproductive processes are clearly shared by women and our large domestic animals, cycle features, regulatory
factors, and study focus might vary significantly. Cycle irregularities and lack of ovulation, for example, are
very common in postpubertal adolescent women (Golden and Carlson, 2008), but would not have been
acceptable in breeding animals, and reduced fertility during reproductive aging is a major research focus in
women but not in domestic animals, which are not usually bred late in life.