Comparison of electronic volume and forward scatter principles of cell selection using flow cytometry for the evaluation of acrosome and plasma membrane integrity of bull spermatozoa

The objective of the study was to compare two different flow cytometers to reveal if there are differences between them and to find the most suitable protocol for analysis of spermatozoa. These two flow cytometers; Cell Lab Quanta™ and Coulter Epics XL, have different principles to calculate cell size, electric volume, and forward scatter (FS), respectively. Flow cytometry is a valuable tool to assess various spermatozoa quality traits simultaneously, such as plasma membrane and acrosome integrity. A double- and triple-stain combination was performed to compare evaluation of these two parameters by both flow cytometers and to assess the need of a fluorescent probe to identify the spermatozoa. Propidium iodide was used to assess the proportion of dead spermatozoa, whereas Alexa Fluor® 488 conjugated peanut agglutinin (PNA- Alexa 488) was used to evaluate the percentage of acrosome intact and acrosome–reacted cells or degenerated cells. In the triple-stain protocol, MitoTracker® Orange (MO) was included to test the capacity of this probe to discriminate spermatozoa from egg yolk and debris particles present in the semen sample. Cryopreserved semen from 13 Norwegian Red bulls was included in the study and the semen was evaluated immediately after thawing and after 3 hr incubation at 37°C. The results show that there is good agreement between the instruments. Nevertheless, a significant difference was found in percentages of acrosome intact live spermatozoa (% AIL) when including MO as a spermatozoa identification probe, compared to assessment without MO, with the Coulter Epics XL, while no significant difference was found when including the probe with the Cell Lab Quanta. In conclusion, the results show that cell size measurement based on electronic volume used by the Cell Lab Quanta flow cytometer is more accurate than FS used by the Coulter Epics XL flow cytometer in identification of spermatozoa. © 2014 International Society for Advancement of Cytometry