Calcium flux is required for the mammalian sperm acrosome reaction, an exocytotic event triggered by egg binding, which results in a dramatic rise in sperm intracellular calcium. Calcium-dependent membrane fusion results in the release of enzymes that facilitate sperm penetration through the zona pellucida during fertilization. We have characterized inositol 1,4,5-trisphosphate (IP3)-gated calc...

Introduction: The precise mechanism for antisperm antibody (ASA) mediated fertility impairment is unclear. In the male reproductive tract, ASA may have an adverse impact on sperm maturation and function or overall semen quality. In this study, the percentage of ASA-IgA was determined by the direct Mixed Agglutination Reaction (MAR) test in men from infertile couples in Khorramabad city. Further...

Clusterin is a major protein in bull reproductive tract secretions and sperm membrane extract. A polyclonal antibody was produced against clusterin from bull cauda epididymal fluid (CEF) and used for the localization of the protein on bull spermatozoa. Immunoblotting of unreduced bovine samples showed that the anticlusterin antibody reacted with a protein of approximately 94- to 100-kd in rete ...

The presence of a novel functional estrogen receptor on the human sperm surface has been demonstrated by using different experimental approaches. Ligand blot analysis of sperm lysates, using peroxidase-conjugated estradiol as probe, identified a specific estradiol-binding protein of approximately 29-kDa apparent molecular mass. The same protein band was also revealed by using alphaH222 antibody...

OBJECTIVE To assess whether incubation in TEST-yolk buffer (TYB) or human tubal fluid (HTF) could alter the sperm membrane characteristics and its relationship to antisperm antibodies (ASA) and/or antigen detachment from the sperm membrane and to evaluate the filtration of those specimens and possible recovery of ASA-free spermatozoa. DESIGN A prospective clinical study. SETTING Andrology I...

Complement-fixing anti-DNA antibodies were detected in a minority of sera of rabbits hyperimmunized with killed Gram-negative bacteria. The C'-fixing property of DNA was lost after DNase treatment. Preferential reactivity with denatured DNA was observed. The antisera reacted with DNA preparations derived from rabbit bone marrow and thymus, calf thymus, pneumococci, salmon sperm, and Escherichia...

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...

After the acrosome reaction, the PH-20 surface antigen of guinea pig sperm migrates from its original location on the posterior head surface to a new location on the inner acrosomal membrane (Myles, D.G., and P. Primakoff, 1984, J. Cell Biol., 99:1634-1641). We have isolated three monoclonal antibodies (MAbs) of the IgG1 subclass, PH-20, PH-21, and PH-22, that bind to the PH-20 antigen. The PH-...