Defining spermatozoa cell surface proteome for improved breeding

众所周知，男性不育是哺乳动物生殖的一个主要问题，反过来又可能危及人类活动的许多社会经济领域。在这方面，全球对提高饲养能力的压力加强了为改善动物饲养以及牲畜的大小和质量而作出的持续努力。因此，必须更好地描述受精过程的组成部分，以便将其与精子受精能力及其成功育种的潜力联系起来。令人惊讶的是，相对较少的蛋白质表面的精子已被最终确定为发挥一定的作用，或显示出一个关键的重要性，成功的繁殖。在这项应用中，我们将利用新的强大的分子方法来确定已知的和新的组件或与新鲜射出的牛精子的膜。这种鉴定最终将应用于育种行业，通过确定精液受精潜力，使人们能够选择更高质量的精子。同时，除了更好地了解这一生物过程，我们的目标也是确定蛋白质的积极和消极的精子冷冻保存（冷藏）的过程中，一个非常重要的经济领域，考虑到，现在，大多数育种是通过使用冷冻精子人工授精完成。为此，我们将重点关注猪、羊、马或牛等重要的经济物种。总之，实现这些目标有助于增加知识，这可能直接有利于牛的育种和饲养。

It is well recognized that male infertility represents a major problem for mammalian reproduction and, in turn, can endanger numerous socio-economic areas of human activities. In this context, the sustained efforts towards improving animal breeding and both the size and quality of our livestock are reinforced by the global pressure on increasing feeding capacities. Thus, it is essential that a better description of the components of the fertilization process be acquired so as to relate it to the spermatozoa fertilization capacities and to its potential for successful breeding endeavors. Surprisingly, relatively few proteins at the surface of the spermatozoa have nowadays been conclusively identified as playing a definite role or displaying a pivotal importance for successful reproduction. In this application, we will take advantage of new powerful molecular approaches to identify known and novel components in or associated with the membrane of freshly ejaculated bovine spermatozoa. This identification ultimately will be applied in the breeding industry through allowing the determination of the semen fertilization potential enabling one to select higher quality sperm. Concomitantly, in addition to better understanding this biological process, it is also our goal to identify proteins positively and negatively contributing to the process of sperm cryopreservation (cold storage), an area of great economic importance considering that, nowadays, most breeding is accomplished through artificial insemination using frozen spermatozoa. To do this, we will focus on economically important species such pig, sheep, horse or bovine species. Taken together, reaching these objectives could contribute to an increased knowledge which could directly benefit breeding and rearing of cattle.