Effects Of Intracellular Zinc Depletion On The Abundance Of VDAC MRNA In Cultured Human Spermatozoa

Objective: To investigate whether intracellular zinc depletion can actually changespermatozoa motility and the abundance of voltage-dependent anion channel (VDAC)mRNA in cultured human spermatozoa.Materials and Methods: Spermatozoa were separated from ejaculates of threedonors using a discontinuous Percoll gradient centrifugation and were exposed to acell membrane-permeable zinc chelator N,N,N’,N’-tetrakis(2-pyridylmethy1)Ethylenediamine (TPEN)(2μM) and to TPEN plus zinc sulfate (5μM) for24hours.CASA and quantitative real-time PCR (qPCR) were performed to detect spermmotility characteristics and mRNA abundance and difference of the three VDACsubtypes between three different treatment groups respectively.Results: The results of CASA demonstrated that exposure of spermatozoa to TPENfor three hours significantly decreased sperm motility compared with the controlgroup (P=0.049，n=3). qPCR demonstrated that VDAC3mRNA level of TPENgroup was significantly lower than that of control group (P=0.0495，n=3).Co-addition of zinc partly reversed TPEN-induced alterations of sperm motility andVDAC3mRNA abundance.Conclusion: The results of the present study implicate that zinc depletion mayinduce decreased VDAC3mRNA abundance and affect the normal function ofspermatozoa.