Sperm rescue in wild African elephants
Joseph Saragusty A D , María Teresa Prieto A , Alexandre Courtiol A , Romain Potier B C , Frank Göritz A , Thomas B. Hildebrandt A and Robert Hermes A
+ Author Affiliations
- Author Affiliations
A Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research, Alfred-Kowalke-Straße 17, D-10315 Berlin, Germany.
B ZooParc de Beauval, 41110 Saint Aignan s/ Cher, France.
C Present address: FauneVet, CHV Atlantia, 22 rue René Viviani, 44200 Nantes, France.
D Corresponding author. Email: saragusty@izw-berlin.de
Reproduction, Fertility and Development 28(9) 1433-1442 https://doi.org/10.1071/RD14378
Submitted: 6 October 2014 Accepted: 2 February 2015 Published: 13 March 2015
Abstract
This study investigated ways of improving the usefulness of ~1700 mL of poor-quality frozen semen collected from wild African elephant (Loxodonta africana) bulls. Ten semen samples from six bulls, frozen with 5% glycerol in Berliner cryomedium, with or without prior removal of the seminal plasma by centrifugation, were tested. All samples were subjected to the following density-gradient centrifugation treatments: no centrifugation (control), sham centrifugation, Percoll, OptiPrep, Isolate and PureSperm. Sample evaluation included motility, concentration, viability, acrosome integrity and normal morphology after thawing and after gradient centrifugation. Motility was also evaluated 3 h after thawing. While all treatments were similar to the Control in acrosome integrity and normal morphology, significant differences were noted in concentration, viability and motility. Samples treated by Percoll showed the best motility, which was maintained unchanged over 3 h of incubation (37°C). Correlations between manual and automated evaluations of concentration were high (cytometer; rho = 0.92), but were lower for viability (cytometer; rho = 0.57) and motility (computer-aided sperm analysis; rho = 0.66). By performing density centrifugation, the quality of these sperm samples may be improved to a level suitable for artificial insemination in elephants. Although a sizeable proportion of cells are lost in the process, combining samples may still allow for multiple inseminations.
Additional keywords: conservation, cryopreservation, directional freezing, endangered, spermatozoa.
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