Prevention of fertilization by exposure of hamster eggs to soluble acrosin

Abstract

Incubation of hamster eggs with trypsin or chymotrypsin, but not with a series of glycosidases or lipases, prevents capacitated spermatozoa from binding to the zona pellucida so that fertilization is prevented (Hartmann & Gwatkin, 1971; Gwatkin, Williams & Andersen, 1973). Inactivation of the binding sites for spermatozoa on the zona pellucida by a trypsin-like protease released by discharge of cortical granules also appears to be responsible for the zona reaction which prevents polyspermy (Gwatkin, Williams, Hartmann & Kniazuk, 1973). Acrosin is also a trysin-like protease and it can be extracted from sperm acrosomes. We therefore investigated whether the fertilization of hamster eggs is blocked by incubation with soluble acrosin.