Interaction Between Hyaluronic Acid Semi‐Interpenetrated Hydrogel with Bull Spermatozoa: Studies of Sperm Attachment–Release and Sperm Quality

BLOIS, DAMIÁN; MORILLA, GRICELDA; BARBERO, CÉSAR A.; RIVAROLA, CLAUDIA R.; LIAUDAT, ANA C.; RIVERO, REBECA E.; RODRÍGUEZ, NANCY; CAPELLA, VIRGINIA; BROGLIA, MARTÍN; BOSCH, PABLO

Advanced Materials Interfaces

John Wiley and Sons Ltd

Año: 2021

The study of living systems in contact with biocompatible synthetic hydrogelsis developing. The authors´ group is the first to propose use of polymericmaterials to accomplish sperm selection process by attachment of bull spermto hydrogel surfaces, this being a crucial step for successful assisted repro-ductive techniques (ARTs). Surfaces based on poly(N-isopropylacrylamide)hydrogels (PNIPAM) and ionic and neutral copolymers are synthetized. Theirphysicochemical properties in aqueous and culture medium are related tothe percentage of attachment and subsequent release of bull spermatozoafrom the hydrogel surface. High attaching capacity (30?45%) of sperm oncationic and neutral surfaces is mainly observed, however, sperm detachmentfrom the hydrogel using traditional induction processes (i.e., sperm capacita-tion) is not significant. Therefore, PNIPAM-co-20%-N-Tris(hydroxymethyl)methyl acrylamide (PNIPAM-HMA) hydrogel surface is semi-interpenetratedwith hyaluronic acid (HA). In this case, 50% of spermatozoa are attached toPNIPAM-HMA-HA hydrogel and after treatment with hyaluronidase, 47% ofthem are released. Collected sperm show acceptable characteristics of pro-gressive motility (70% with score 4 for vigor), high viability, and cytoplasmicmembrane integrity. Noteworthy, the study of the interaction of hydrogel sur-face/spermatozoa can be extended to human and other mammalian species,in order to provide advanced alternatives for gamete selection for ARTs.