Abstract

Intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) in horses is currently employed for clinical and commercial uses, but the protocol could be optimized to improve its efficiency. We have hypothesized that destabilization of plasma and acrosomal membranes prior to injection would positively impact the developmental potential of equine zygotes generated by ICSI. This study evaluated effects of the sperm treatment with lysolecithin on plasma and acrosomal membranes and on oocyte activation ability, initially following heterologous ICSI on bovine oocytes and subsequently employing equine oocytes. The effects of the lysolecithin -treatment on the efficiency of conventional and piezo-assisted equine ICSI were evaluated. To do this, the equine sperm were treated with different concentrations of lysolecithin and the sperm plasma membrane, acrosome and DNA integrity were evaluated by flow cytometry. The results showed that a lysolecithin concentration of 0.08 % destabilized the membranes of all sperm and affected DNA integrity within the range described for the species (8-30 %). In addition, the heterologous ICSI assay showed that lysolecithin treatment was detrimental to the sperm's ability to activate the oocyte, therefore, chemical oocyte activation was used after equine ICSI after injection with lysolecithin -treated sperm. This group showed similar developmental rate to the control group with and without exogenous activation. In conclusion, lysolecithin pre-treatment is not necessary when using ICSI to produce equine embryos in vitro. The results from the current study provide additional insight regarding the factors impacting ICSI in horses.