Miller Jessica S, Bose Aneesh P H, Fitzpatrick John L, Balshine Sigal
Department of Psychology, Neuroscience, & Behaviour, McMaster University, Hamilton, Canada.
Institute for Biology, Karl-Franzens-University, Graz, Austria.
J Fish Biol. 2019 Mar;94(3):434-445. doi: 10.1111/jfb.13912. Epub 2019 Feb 21.
Using the plainfin midshipman fish Porichthys notatus, a species with alternative reproductive tactics (ARTs), we investigated how sperm maturation shapes sperm competitive abilities. We compared sperm performance and morphology before and after final sperm maturation by sampling sperm from the testes and stripped ejaculates of guarders and sneakers. In accordance with sperm competition risk theory, ejaculates from sneaker males had three times as much sperm as ejaculates from guarder males and sneaker males produced faster swimming sperm than guarder males, but this was only the case after final sperm maturation had occurred. Additionally, fully mature sperm found in ejaculates had larger heads and midpieces than sperm found in the testes. These results emphasize the important role played by non-sperm components of an ejaculate in mediating sperm performance and potentially also morphology.
利用具有替代繁殖策略（ARTs）的细纹后肛鱼（Porichthys notatus），我们研究了精子成熟如何塑造精子竞争能力。我们通过从守卫型和偷情型雄鱼的睾丸及采得的射精精液中取样精子，比较了最终精子成熟前后的精子性能和形态。根据精子竞争风险理论，偷情型雄鱼的射精精液中的精子数量是守卫型雄鱼射精精液中精子数量的三倍，且偷情型雄鱼产生的精子游动速度比守卫型雄鱼的更快，但这仅在最终精子成熟发生之后才如此。此外，射精精液中发现的完全成熟精子的头部和中段比睾丸中发现的精子更大。这些结果强调了射精精液中的非精子成分在介导精子性能以及潜在地在介导精子形态方面所起的重要作用。
