Estrogen receptors in murine testis and sperm

0455587 - BTÚ 2016 eng C - Conference Paper (international conference)
Dostálová, Pavla - Děd, Lukáš - Elzeinová, Fatima - Žatecká, Eva - Dvořáková-Hortová, Kateřina - Pěknicová, Jana
Estrogen receptors in murine testis and sperm.
[8th Meeting of the International network for Young Researchers in Male Fertility. Florencie (IT), 14.05.2015-16.05.2015]
R&D Projects: GA ČR(CZ) GA14-05547S; GA MŠMT(CZ) ED1.100/02.0109
Institutional support: RVO:86652036
Keywords : estrogen receptor alpha * estrogen receptor beta * immunofluorescence
Subject RIV: EB - Genetics ; Molecular Biology

In males, testes are the main source of estrogens. Physiological estrogen level is essential for sperm production and absence or high levels of estrogens lead to damage of spermatogenesis. Estrogen signalling is a complex process that depends on cell milieu and presence of receptors. Nowadays, two types of classical estrogen receptors (ERs), namely ERα and ERβ, are known. Activation of ERs may lead to changes in gene expression or rapid non-genomic responses. ERs may form homodimers (αα, ββ) as well as heterodimers (αβ). In addition to wild-type variants, several variants with different DNA- and ligand-binding properties have been described. These variants may directly mediate estrogen signalling, or they may modulate the function of full-length ERs and contribute to overall estrogen signalling. The aim of this work is to determine the expression pattern of ERs in testis and sperm. We detected both classical ERs in murine testis and sperm at mRNA and protein level. Protein was detected in nuclear, cytosolic and membrane fraction. Further, we also detected 2 shorter variants apart from full-length ERβ. We localized ERs (α, β) in acrosomal region and tail in sperm at different maturation stages (testicular, during epididymal maturation). It seem that the overall estrogen signalling in testes and sperm is mediated by several ER variants. Furthermore, both pathways, genomic and nongenomic, will be probably involved in estrogen signaling in testes. The next question whether these variants may interact together will be studied by expression analysis of ERs in individual cell types.
Permanent Link: http://hdl.handle.net/11104/0257782