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Ginsenoside Re increases fertile and asthenozoospermic infertile human sperm motility by induction of nitric oxide synthase

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Abstract

We investigated the effects of Ginsenoside Re on human sperm motility in fertile and asthenozoospermic infertile individualsin vitro and the mechanism by which the Ginsenosides play their roles. The semen samples were obtained from 10 fertile volunteers and 10 asthenozoospermic infertile patients. Spermatozoa were separated by Percoll and incubated with 0, 1, 10 or 100 μM of Ginsenoside Re. Total sperm motility and progressive motility were measured by computer-aided sperm analyzer (CASA). Nitric oxide synthase (NOS) activity was determined by the3H-arginine to3H-citrulline conversion assay, and the NOS protein was examined by the Western blot analysis. The production of sperm nitric oxide (NO) was detected using the Griess reaction. The results showed that Ginsenoside Re significantly enhanced both fertile and infertile sperm motility, NOS activity and NO production in a concentration-dependent manner. Sodium nitroprusside (SNP, 100 nM), a NO donor, mimicked the effects of Ginsenoside Re. And pretreatment with a NOS inhibitorN ω-Nitro-L-arginine methyl ester (L-NAME, 100 μM) or a NO scavengerN-Acetyl-L-cysteine (LNAC, 1 mM) completely blocked the effects of Ginsenoside Re. Data suggested that Ginsenoside Re is beneficial to sperm motility, and that induction of NOS to increase NO production may be involved in this benefit.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Medical Physics, Institute of Modern Physics, The Chinese Academy of Sciences, 730000, Lanzhou, China

    Hong Zhang, Qing-Ming Zhou, Xiao-Da Li, Yi Xie, Xin Duan, Feng-Ling Min, Bing Liu & Zhi-Gang Yuan

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  1. Hong Zhang
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Correspondence to Hong Zhang.

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Zhang, H., Zhou, QM., Li, XD. et al. Ginsenoside Re increases fertile and asthenozoospermic infertile human sperm motility by induction of nitric oxide synthase. Arch Pharm Res 29, 145–151 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02974276

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