ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Vet. Sci.

Sec. Animal Reproduction - Theriogenology

Volume 12 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fvets.2025.1577004

This article is part of the Research TopicReproductive biotechnologies and challenges in their application - volume IIView all 5 articles

Sperm Cellular and Nuclear Dynamics Associated with Ram Fertility

Provisionally accepted
Mustafa BoduMustafa Bodu1,2Mustafa HititMustafa Hitit1,3*Ayse SariAyse Sari4Mesut KirbasMesut Kirbas5Bulent BulbulBulent Bulbul6Mehmet Bozkurt AtamanMehmet Bozkurt Ataman2Mustafa Numan BucakMustafa Numan Bucak2John ParrishJohn Parrish7Abdullah KayaAbdullah Kaya2,7*Erdogan MemiliErdogan Memili1*
  • 1Prairie View A&M University, Prairie View, United States
  • 2Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Selçuk University, Konya, Türkiye
  • 3Kastamonu University, Kastamonu, Kastamonu, Türkiye
  • 4Necmettin Erbakan University, Karatay, Konya, Türkiye
  • 5Bahri Dagdas International Agricultural Research Institute (BDUTAE), Konya, Türkiye
  • 6Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Dokuz Eylül University, Alsancak, İzmir, Türkiye
  • 7Department of Animal and Dairy Sciences, College of Agricultural and Life Sciences, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, Wisconsin, United States

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

Select one of your emails

You have multiple emails registered with Frontiers:

Notify me on publication

Please enter your email address:

If you already have an account, please login

You don't have a Frontiers account ? You can register here

This study was aimed at analyzing DNA integrity, shape morphology, and membrane integrity in sperm from low (LF) and adequate or normal fertility (AF) rams. We used sperm chromatin dispersion assay, Fourier harmonic amplitudes (FHA) analysis, other image analysis of morphometric parameters as well as other diverse sperm evaluation methods. An additional goal was to employ new statistical models with high reliability to predict ram fertility based on sperm head morphology parameters. Fresh semen was collected from 41 AF (conception rate: 95.07 ± 0.56%) and 27 LF (conception rate: 79.72 ± 2.52%) rams using artificial vagina. We observed differences (p<0.05) in percent motile sperm (mean ± sem, 64 ± 3 %, 72 ± 2%) percent viable sperm (78 ± 2%, 84 ± 1%) and head and acrosome abnormalities (1.9 ± 0.4%, 3.4 ± 0.4 %) between LF and AF rams. Fertility of rams was not associated with DNA fragmentation (p>0.05). The FHA approach allowed the construction of an average ram sperm head shape and harmonic amplitude 2 tended to differ between ram fertility groups (p=0.059). Based on FHA and morphometric analysis, a significant linear discriminant model was constructed (p=0.0013) and allowed for specificity at identifying LF rams (6/9, 66.9%) and sensitivity to identify AF rams (39/47, 83.0%). The overall error rate remained good and was 11/56 (20%). The results of this study suggest that sperm DNA damage might not be used to predict ram fertility, but the statistical model based on FHA is a potential tool in predicting ram fertility.

Keywords: ram, Fertility, DNA integrity, Sperm Head, Fourier Analysis

Received: 14 Feb 2025; Accepted: 17 Apr 2025.

Copyright: © 2025 Bodu, Hitit, Sari, Kirbas, Bulbul, Ataman, Bucak, Parrish, Kaya and Memili. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

* Correspondence:
Mustafa Hitit, Prairie View A&M University, Prairie View, United States
Abdullah Kaya, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Selçuk University, Konya, 42250, Türkiye
Erdogan Memili, Prairie View A&M University, Prairie View, United States

Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

Supplementary Material