title: Metabolic activity of sperm cells: correlation with sperm cell concentration, viability and motility in the rabbit.
abstract: The resazurin reduction test (RRT) is a useful technique to assess the metabolic rate of sperm cells. RRT depends on the ability of metabolically active cells to reduce the non-fluorescent dye resazurin to the fluorescent resorufin. The aim of this study was to develop a vital fluorometric method to evaluate metabolic activity of rabbit sperm cells. Twenty-five rabbit males were included in the study. Viability and morphology, motility and metabolic activity were evaluated using an eosin-nigrosin staining, a computer-assisted semen analysis (CASA) and the RRT, respectively. Spearman rank correlation analysis was used to determine the correlation between RRT and semen parameters. After evaluation, a concentration of 10 × 106 sperm cells/ml was selected for further experiments with RRT. No significant correlation was found between the RRT results and the motility parameters. However, after RRT a significant positive correlation between relative fluorescence units and the percentage of alive spermatozoa (r = 0.62; P = 0.001) and a negative one with the percentage of sperm cells with acrosomic abnormalities (r = -0.45; P < 0.05) were detected. The vital assessment of metabolic rate of sperm cells by RRT could provide more information about semen quality than other routine semen analysis, correlating with sperm viability and acrosome status information.
authors.affiliation: Department of Animal Health and Anatomy,Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona,08193 Bellaterra,Spain.
authors.forename: Maria
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Sabés-Alsina
authors.affiliation: Department of Gastroenterology and Bioinformatics Platform,CIBERehd,Barcelona,Spain.
authors.forename: Núria
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Planell
authors.affiliation: Centre d'Estudis en Biofísica. Faculty of Medicine,Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona,08193 Bellaterra,Spain.
authors.forename: Sílvia
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Gil
authors.affiliation: Department of Animal Health and Anatomy,Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona,08193 Bellaterra,Spain.
authors.forename: Oriol
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Tallo-Parra
authors.affiliation: Department of Animal Health and Anatomy,Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona,08193 Bellaterra,Spain.
authors.forename: Maria José
authors.initials: MJ
authors.lastname: Maya-Soriano
authors.affiliation: Department of Animal Health and Anatomy,Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona,08193 Bellaterra,Spain.
authors.forename: Ester
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Taberner
authors.affiliation: Unitat de Cunicultura,Institut de Recerca i Tecnologia Agroalimentàries,Torre Marimon s/n,08182,Caldes de Montbui,Barcelona,Spain.
authors.forename: Miriam
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Piles
authors.affiliation: Centre d'Estudis en Biofísica. Faculty of Medicine,Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona,08193 Bellaterra,Spain.
authors.forename: Manel
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Sabés
authors.affiliation: Department of Animal Health and Anatomy,Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona,08193 Bellaterra,Spain.
authors.forename: Manel
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Lopez-Bejar
mesh_terms: D020101:Acrosome Reaction; D000818:Animals; D002470:Cell Survival; D005470:Fluorometry / Q000379:methods*; D008297:Male; D010078:Oxazines / Q000378:metabolism; D011817:Rabbits; D055101:Semen Analysis / Q000379:methods*; D013076:Sperm Count; D013081:Sperm Motility; D013094:Spermatozoa / Q000166:cytology* / Q000378:metabolism*; D014966:Xanthenes / Q000378:metabolism
chemical_list: D010078:Oxazines; D014966:Xanthenes; C005843:resazurin
keywords: Acrosome; Metabolic activity; Rabbit; Resazurin reduction test; Sperm cell