The aim of the present study was to determine seasonal variations in semen characteristics, testicular size, and plasma testosterone concentration in Iranian Khalkhali goats. An artificial vagina was used to collect semen from 10 bucks (2–4 years of age), from November 2013 to October 2014. Testicular circumference was higher (P<0.05) from September to October. Ejaculate volume, sperm ...

Heat stress (HS) often blamed for suboptimal reproductive efficiency and is a worldwide problem, which inflicts heavy economic losses reflected in limiting the breeding season of rabbits to be normally from September to May in northern hemisphere and subtropical regions. The present experiment was conducted to study the effect of summer heat stress and the alleviating effect of some antioxidant...

Ergothioneine (ET) is a unique natural antioxidant which mammalia acquire exclusively from their food. Recently, we have discovered an ET transporter (ETT; gene symbol SLC22A4). The existence of a specific transporter suggests a beneficial role for ET; however, the precise physiological purpose of ET is still unclear. A conspicuous site of high extracellular ET accumulation is boar seminal plas...

diffusion of nitrogen in plasma nitrided iron and structural evolution during the nitriding process were evaluated by several characterization techniques including optical microscopy (om), microhardness depth profiling (hdp), scanning electron microscopy (sem), x-ray diffraction (xrd), glow discharge optical emission spectroscopy (gdoes), and secondary ion mass spectroscopy (sims). plasma nitri...

The rate of obesity among men of reproductive age has tripled in the last three decades. Previously, we demonstrated that paternal obesity resulted in impaired preimplantation developmental kinetics, compromised post-compaction metabolism and decreased blastocyst cell number when embryos were generated in vivo. Subsequently, using in vitro fertilization we found embryos of obese males to have a...

Some time ago it became necessary in this department to have a rapid and reliable method for the determination of iron in blood serum or plasma. The method was required for teaching purposes on human subjects and for investigations on iron metabolism in various species. Since none of the published techniques seemed quite suitable, a new one was based on the experience of the author (Ramsay, 195...

Spermatozoa of freshwater Cyprinidae (goldfish, carp, crucian carp and dace) remained immotile when the semen was diluted in solutions of NaCl, KCl, mannitol or glucose iso-osmolar to the seminal plasma (300 mosmol kg-1). The spermatozoa became motile in media containing these solutes if the osmolality was lower than that of the seminal plasma, suggesting that motility is suppressed by the osmo...