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Mol. Hum. Reprod. Advance Access originally published online on February 6, 2008
Molecular Human Reproduction 2008 14(3):137-142; doi:10.1093/molehr/gan002
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© The Author 2008. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

Identification and characterization of novel mammalian spermatogenic genes conserved from fly to human

Edmundo Bonilla1,2 and Eugene Yujun Xu1,3

1Divison of Reproductive Biology Research, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Center for Genetic Medicine, Northwestern University, Feinberg School of Medicine, Lurie 7-117, Chicago, IL 60611, USA 2Department of Health Sciences, UAMI, 09340 Mexico City, Mexico

3 Correspondence address. Tel: +1-312-5030481; Fax: +1-312-9033074; E-mail: e-xu{at}northwestern.edu

Spermatogenesis is a complex and highly regulated developmental process by which round spermatogonial stem cells undergo mitotic proliferation and meiosis, followed by extraordinary differentiation into highly specialized elongated mature sperm. Extensive differences in terms of sperm production such as testicular structure and organization, hormonal regulation are reported between humans and insects, yet it is not known to what extent components of the process could be conserved and furthermore to what extent the underlying genetic regulators could be shared from insects to mammals. We hence take a genomic approach to identify genes which are expressed in the testes of both fly and mouse through in silico analysis and are phylogenetically conserved across metazoans. Fifty eight testis-enriched, phylogenetically conserved from fly to mouse genes were identified. Among them, 12 genes are novel. Detailed characterization of their murine and human homologs indicate most of them are testis-restricted or enriched and developmentally regulated, thus suggesting that they are important regulators of sperm development in mammals and potential human fertility factors. Our results reveal the existence of spermatogenic homologs with similar testicular expression across a large evolutionary distance, further functional study will be needed to explore the functional conservation among those spermatogenic orthologs.

Key words: spermatogenesis/male fertility/germline development/testis/conserved genes

Submitted on August 3, 2007; resubmitted on December 19, 2007; accepted on January 7, 2008.


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