Human epididymal CRISP1 (hCRISP1) associates with sperm during maturation and participates in gamete fusion through egg complementary sites. Its homology with both rodent epididymal CRISP1 and CRISP4 reported to participate in the previous stage of sperm binding to the zona pellucida (ZP), led us to further investigate the functional role of hCRISP1 by studying its involvement in human sperm-ZP...

Background: During spermatogenesis the sperm nucleus exchange histones against cystein rich protamines, which stabilize the sperm chromatin and protects the DNA against damages. At ejaculation the age of the patient, handling routines, processing of the semen sample and the storage of the final sperm suspension might damage the DNA. Sperm chromatin stability and DNA damages are evaluated with d...

BACKGROUND Human sperm chemotaxis to pre-ovulatory follicular fluid is well established in vitro. However, it is not known whether the female's oocyte-cumulus complex secretes sperm chemoattractants subsequent to ovulation (for enabling sperm chemotaxis within the Fallopian tube) and, if so, which of these cell types--the oocyte or the cumulus oophorus--is the physiological origin of the secret...

BACKGROUND The condensed state of the human sperm's chromatin is essential for the compact structure of the spermatozoon head, which is important for the fertilization process. The enzymes DNA topoisomerases (topo I and topo II) are responsible for the topological structure of the chromatin in somatic cells. The activities and the characterization of topoisomerases in mature human sperm cells h...

BACKGROUND Advances in the definition of the function and the mechanism of estrogen action in different tissues have come from human and animal models of estrogen insufficiency. Recently we have demonstrated that aromatase is present and biologically active in human ejaculated sperm, suggesting that autonomous estradiol sperm production may influence sperm functions. In the present study we inv...

Background: CAPZA3 is one of the actin-capping proteins believed to be play an important role in controlling of actin polymerization during spermiogenesis and has been shown to be peresent in mature sperm. Immunohistochemistry showed that human CAPZA3 is localized in the neck region of ejaculated sperm, with moderate and faint signals also detected in the tail and post-acrosome region respectiv...

The female steroid hormone progesterone regulates ovulation and supports pregnancy, but also controls human sperm function within the female reproductive tract. Progesterone causes elevation of sperm intracellular Ca(2+) leading to sperm hyperactivation, acrosome reaction, and perhaps chemotaxis toward the egg. Although it has been suggested that progesterone-dependent Ca(2+) influx into human ...

Background: Cholesterol loaded cyclodextrin (CLC) efficiently protected sperm from some species. On the other hand vitrification of sperm especially in human opened a new horizon in the field of sperm freezing. The aim of the present study was to evaluate CLC on vitrification of cat sperm. Materials and Methods: Tom epididymal sperm (n=9) was extracted from epididymides and subjected to vitrifi...

background: some evidences showed that the secretion of uterine tube vagina and follicular fluid (ff) affects x and y-chromosome populations. sperm selection with x or y chromosome can added to oocyte for gender desired. the isolation of x y sperm have done and all efforts in this field are done to make culture media similar to in vivo condition. the objective of this study was to find if the f...

BACKGROUND Our previous studies have demonstrated the cystic fibrosis transmembrane conductance regulator (CFTR) is important for capacitation and male fertility in mouse and guinea pig spermatozoa. However, the exact function of CFTR on human sperm fertilizing capacity, and correlation with sperm quality has not been established. The present study may shed light on some unexplained male infert...