Slo3 Channel is Essential for Fertilized Egg Development by Controlling Critical Molecules for Mitosis

Slo3 channels are specially expressed in testis and sperms. Slo3 KO mice are male infertile but the mechanism remains elusive. In this abstract, we first use Ca2+ imaging method measured Ca2+ entry of wild type sperms and Slo3 KO mice sperms. We found that Ca2+ entry can be normally induced by high K+, cGMP and cAMP in all tested conditions in both capacitated or uncapacitated sperms. Thus, the male infertile phenotype cannot be explained by abnormal Ca2+ entry in fertilization process. Furthermore, in vitro fertilization indicated fertilized eggs with slo3 KO sperms can develop into two cell stage but cannot pass through this developing stage. In order to investigate the reason of stopping development, we performed micro-array analysis using testis tissues both from wild type mice and Slo3 KO mice. The results indicate that expression level of large numbers genes had been altered in Slo3 KO mice testis, not only in spermtocytes but also in steroli cells. Further analysis reviewed that critical gene is required for mitosis had been missed. In the meantime, we confirmed that fertilized eggs stayed in mitosis stage and cannot develop further. Thus, we concluded that Slo3 channels are essential for fertilized eggs development by controlling critical molecules in mitosis.