Cortisol is an Important Regulator of Human Sperm Physiology

MATA MARTINEZ ESPERANZA; SHEINI SÁNCHEZ-GONZÁLEZ; JORGE ARTURO TORRES JUÁREZ; ARIAS RODOLFO J; DE BLAS GERARDO A; SÁNCHEZ-TUSIE ANA ALICIA

Congreso; XXXIII Congreso Nacional de Bioquímica - SOCIEDAD MEXICANA DE BIOQUIMICA; 2021

SOCIEDAD MEXICANA DE BIOQUIMICA

Fertilization is an essential event for the generation of a new individual and propagation of species. In human sperm cells, three indispensable events must occur for fertilization: motility hyperactivation, capacitation and acrosome reaction (AR). In these three crucial events, CatSper, a sperm-specific calcium channel, plays a critical role. Progesterone (P4), a steroid hormone, is considered the main ligand in CatSper. However, the function of other steroid hormones like cortisol, has not been fully evaluated in human sperm physiology so the aim of the present work is to evaluate the effects of cortisol on human sperm intracellular Ca2+ mobilization, motility, chemotaxis and AR. Using capacitated human sperm and different physiological concentrations of cortisol we perform: 1) population spectrofluorometry to evaluate the increase of intracellular calcium using the fluorescent probe sensible to Ca2+ (fluo3-AM); 2) we evaluated the effects of cortisol on chemotaxis with sperm selection assay (SSA), 3) and finally we quantified the AR using FITC-PSA and Coomassie Blue. Our results indicate that cortisol is able to induce a low increase in intracellular Ca2+ compared to P4 response and does not induce chemotaxis. Related to AR, we observed that, in low concentrations, cortisol can induce AR and when coincubating it with Pg, it apparently competes for the binding site, decreasing the percentage of AR induced by Pg. These results highlight the important role of cortisol in infertility.