Department of Animal and Dairy Sciences, Mississippi State University, USA.
Department of Animal Science, Federal University of Ceará, Brazil.
Anim Reprod Sci. 2020 Sep;220:106355. doi: 10.1016/j.anireprosci.2020.106355. Epub 2020 Apr 1.
Bull fertility is crucial for efficient, profitable, and sustainable agriculture of cattle. Despite the fact that the uses of sperm from low fertility bulls cause millions of dollars economic losses, conventional methods available to accurately predict bull fertility are still of limited use. Although breeding bulls produce billions of sperm mostly with normal motility and morphology, some bulls are afflicted with poor fertility due to molecular or cellular defects in the sperm. Sperm functional genome including transcriptome, proteome, and metabolome influence bull fertility. Through high throughput screening methods of metabolomics, specific small molecules have been described both for seminal plasma and sperm. Compared to sperm, seminal plasma contains much higher numbers and levels of metabolites. Although the identities and functions of many of these metabolites are known, such knowledge is still yet to be generated for a greater number of metabolites of sperm and seminal plasma. Once validated as fertility markers, sperm, and seminal plasma metabolites can be used to evaluate semen quality and predict bull fertility, and/or used in assisted reproductive technologies. This review describes the possibility to use small molecules (in the review called metabolites) as fertility predictors.
公牛的繁殖力对牛的高效、盈利和可持续农业至关重要。尽管使用低生育能力公牛的精子会导致数百万美元的经济损失，但目前可用的准确预测公牛繁殖力的常规方法仍然有限。尽管繁殖公牛主要产生具有正常运动能力和形态的数十亿精子，但由于精子的分子或细胞缺陷，一些公牛仍然存在繁殖力差的问题。精子功能基因组包括转录组、蛋白质组和代谢组，影响公牛的繁殖力。通过代谢组学的高通量筛选方法，已经在精液和精子中描述了特定的小分子。与精子相比，精液中含有更多数量和更高水平的代谢物。尽管这些代谢物的许多身份和功能已经为人所知，但对于精子和精液中的更多代谢物，仍然需要生成这样的知识。一旦被验证为生育力标志物，精子和精液代谢物可用于评估精液质量和预测公牛的繁殖力，和/或用于辅助生殖技术。本文综述了将小分子（在本文中称为代谢物）用作生育力预测因子的可能性。
