Development of a novel staining technique for evaluating sperm quality

Abstract

Chemicals can often adversely affect spermatogenesis by disrupting testicular germ cells and/or hormonal levels. An appropriate understanding of the process of spermatogenesis and its hormonal regulation is necessary to evaluate testicular toxicity. Though, there are several approaches to detect the toxicity, the histopathological study of alterations occurred in the seminiferous tubules appear to be the most accepted, sensitive and direct marker of testicular toxicity. However, this conventional approach includes certain quantitative analyses cannot comparative to testes in human and needs for considerable efforts. In addition, this evaluation method may produce defective figures in absence of expertise. Therefore, there is an emergent need to explore quick and efficient methods to detect and explain the cause and nature of testicular toxicity. Further, for most accurate evaluation of testicular toxicity, other key reproductive endpoints must also be considered to know the underlying cause and suppression of spermatogenesis leading to decreased sperm quality and fertility. However, sperm quality and fertility data obtained from rodents exposed to excess chemicals (i.e. food and drug) are not effective for predicting human reproductive toxicity, and there is limited information available about the impact of many chemicals on human spermatozoa. In addition, chemicals that cause adverse effects on sperm quality in rodents, without an effect on mating outcome, may still represent a risk to human because these findings may indicate undesirable effects on reproductive development. The present speech represents both a novel staining technique for evaluating sperm quality and a non-invasive approach for testicular toxicity.