Protein composition of human epididymosomes collected during surgical vasectomy reversal: a proteomic and genomic approach

Abstract

Epididymosomes thus transit along the excurrent duct, and vesicles collected distally represent a mixed population.

The epididymis and its role on sperm quality and male fertility

“…The cholesterol:phospholipids ratio of these vesicles can be as high as 2, and sphingomyelin is the major phospholipid constituent (Sullivan et al, 2005). Epididymosomes in the epididymal fluid have been reported in rat (Eickhoff et al, 2001;Fornes et al, 1995), bovine (Fraile et al, 1996;Frenette et al, 2003;Sutovsky et al, 2001), mouse (Rejraji et al, 2002), horse (Sostaric et al, 2008) and man (Thimon et al, 2008b).…”

“…Some sperm proteins acquired during maturation do not behave as coating proteins when sperm cells are experimentally submitted to different biophysical treatments (Thimon et al, 2008b). Some of them behave as integral membrane proteins, including GPI (glycosylphosphatidylinositol) anchored-proteins (Kirchhoff et al, 1996;Legare et al, 1999), while others are integrated inside sperm cell compartments during the maturational process, probably involved in sperm motility (Eickhoff et al, 2004;Eickhoff et al, 2006;Eickhoff et al, 2001).…”

“…The incorporation of epididymal proteins by spermatozoa cannot be explained by the classical secretory pathway (Cooper, 1998;Sullivan et al, 2007;Thimon et al, 2008b). Many sperm proteins acquired during the epididymal transit behave as integral membrane proteins when cells are treated with different extraction procedures.…”

“…Proteins proposed to be involved in spermegg interaction and motility, as well as proteins involved in remodeling of sperm components or potentially involved in sperm protection and elimination, were shown to be associated with epididymosomes (Sullivan and Saez, 2013). The proteome of cauda epididymosomes collected from the vas deferens during surgical vasectomy reversal in men showed that epididymosomes transit along the epididymis in humans and that vesicles collected distally represent a mixed population of vesicles secreted all along the epididymis (Thimon et al, 2008a;Thimon et al, 2008b).…”

More Than a Simple Lock and Key Mechanism: Unraveling the Intricacies of Sperm-Zona Pellucida Binding

“…Nevertheless, a number of proteins have been shown to be acquired by the sperm during epididymal transit. A non-exhaustive list of these proteins include HE5/CD52 (Kirchhoff and Hale, 1996), members of the ADAM family (Girouard, et al, 2011, Oh, et al, 2009), SPAM1 (Zhang and Martin-Deleon, 2003) and other hyaluronidases Sullivan, 2001, Legare, et al, 1999), macrophage migration inhibitory factor (MIF) (Eickhoff, et al, 2001, Girouard, et al, 2011 as well as a number of enzymes including aldose reductase and sorbitol dehydrogenase (Frenette, et al, 2004, Frenette, et al, 2006, Kobayashi, et al, 2002, Thimon, et al, 2008. Collectively these proteins are believed to participate in the modification of the sperm biochemistry and surface architecture conferring the potential to engage in oocyte interactions.…”