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| via healthland.time.com |
Source:Hiroshima University | Summary: The science of breeding chickens has revealed part of the mystery of how certain female animals are able to store sperm long-term. Droplets of fat transferred from female cells to sperm cells may contribute to keeping sperm alive. A scientific understanding of how sperm can be kept viable longer could benefit any fertility-related work.
"The science of breeding chickens has revealed part of the mystery of how certain female animals are able to store sperm long-term. Droplets of fat transferred from female cells to sperm cells may contribute to keeping sperm alive.
Females of some types of insects, reptiles, and birds can store sperm from multiple males within specialized sperm storage areas of their reproductive tracts. Different animals can store sperm for days or years. Stored sperm can fertilize multiple eggs over time, meaning females do not need to mate again to fertilize additional eggs.
"Farmers may be able to more successfully breed their flocks if we could understand how the sperm stays viable in the sperm storage tubules of female chickens. Fertility studies like this are especially relevant to countries that breed native chickens with lower reproductive rates," said Yukinori Yoshimura, Ph.D., leader of the Research Center for Animal Science and Professor in the Graduate School of Biosphere Science at Hiroshima University.
Yoshimura led the research team that identified five types of lipid, or fatty acids, that exist as droplets inside the cells of female chickens' sperm storage tubules. After the chickens were artificially inseminated, a gene responsible for breaking down those lipids became 2.5 times more active. These broken-down lipids may be released into the sperm storage tubules and improve the sperm's survival..."
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