• Journal of Embryo Transfer
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• v.29 no.1
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• pp.51-57
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• 2014

The objectives of this study were to investigate the effects of trehalose as a cryoprotectant for porcine freeze-dried spermatozoa, to find the optimal freeze-drying time and storage periods of freeze-dried spermatozoa, and to find out pronuclear formation rates, cleaved rates, and embryo development through intracytoplasmic injection of freeze-dried spermatozoa on porcine oocytes. The survival rates of spermatozoa after freeze-drying with trehalose treatment were significantly higher than those of them without trehalose treatment (p<0.05). The highest survival rates were found at 75 mM trehalose treatment. The longer storage periods after freeze-drying seemed to have a lower survival rates. Development in culture of pig by ICSI with trehalose treatment were significantly higher than those of them without trehalose treatment (p<0.05). Shorter freeze-drying time of spermatozoa was resulted in the highest cleaved rates and embryo development.

• Reproductive and Developmental Biology
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• v.39 no.3
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• pp.69-76
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• 2015

In a conventional sense, dried-spermatozoa are all dead and motionless due to the lost of their natural ability to penetrate oocytes both in vivo and in vitro. However, their nuclei are completely able to contribute to normal embryonic development even after long-term preservation in a dried state when the dried-spermatozoa are microinjected into the oocytes. In this sense, dried spermatozoa must still be alive. Thus, defining spermatozoa as alive or dead seems rather arbitrary. Several drying method of sperm including freeze-drying, evaporative/convective-drying and heat-drying were represented in this review. Although the drying protocol reported here will need further improvement, the results suggest that it may be possible to store the male genetic resources.