Characterisation of a human sperm cell subpopulation marked by the presence of the TSH2B histone
Stephanie Singleton* A , Olga Mudrak* A B , Mahmood Morshedi A , Sergio Oehninger A , Irina Zalenskaya A and Andrei Zalensky A CA The Jones Institute for Reproductive Medicine, Eastern Virginia Medical School, 601 Colley Avenue, Norfolk, VA 23507, USA.
B Institute of Cytology, Russian Academy of Sciences, St Petersburg 194064, Russia.
C Corresponding author. Email: zalensao@evms.edu
Reproduction, Fertility and Development 19(2) 392-397 https://doi.org/10.1071/RD06099
Submitted: 30 August 2006 Accepted: 6 November 2006 Published: 29 January 2007
Abstract
During the process of mammalian spermiogenesis, a significant reorganisation of the chromatin structure occurs involving the sequential substitution of somatic histones with protamines. In the human sperm nucleus, ~15% of the basic nuclear protein complement is maintained as histones. Human testis/sperm-specific histone H2B (hTSH2B) is a variant of the histone H2B expressed exclusively in spermatogenic germline cells and present in some mature sperm cells. Thus, this protein marks a subpopulation of sperm cells in the ejaculate. Using indirect immunofluorescence, we examined the influence of hTSH2B on zona pellucida binding and sperm head decondensation in amphibian egg cell-free extract. As suggested by previous studies, we found that hTSH2B can be localised in only ~30% of sperm cells within a given ejaculate. We established that the presence of hTSH2B does not influence sperm zona pellucida binding capacity. Finally, we found that decondensation occurred more rapidly and to a greater extent in those cells containing hTSH2B. We propose that the presence or absence of hTSH2B within spermatozoa influences pronuclei formation and the activation of paternal genes following fertilisation and during early embryonic development.
Acknowledgements
We would like to thank Dr E.W. Godfrey for providing the Xenopus facility. This work has been supported by The Endocrine Fellows Foundation Grant to S. S. and NIH grant HD-042748 to A. O. Z.
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* Stephanie Singleton and Olga Mudrak contributed equally to this paper.
