Gut Microbiota-Testis Axis: FMT Mitigates High-Fat Diet-Diminished Male Fertility via Improving Systemic and Testicular Metabolome

Hao, Y., Feng, Y., Yan, X., Cheng, L., Ma, X., Tang, X., Zhong, R., Sun, Z., Agarwal, M.ORCID: 0000-0002-8781-3850, Zhang, H., Zhao, Y. and Kovac, J. (2022) Gut Microbiota-Testis Axis: FMT Mitigates High-Fat Diet-Diminished Male Fertility via Improving Systemic and Testicular Metabolome. Microbiology Spectrum .

Abstract

High-fat diet (HFD)-induced obesity is known to be associated with reduced male fertility and decreased semen quality in humans. HFD-related male infertility is a growing issue worldwide, and it is crucial to overcome this problem to ameliorate the distress of infertile couples. For the first time, we discovered that fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) of alginate oligosaccharide (AOS)-improved gut microbiota (A10-FMT) ameliorated HFD-decreased semen quality (sperm concentration: 286.1 ± 14.1 versus 217.9 ± 17.4 million/mL; sperm motility: 40.1 ± 0.7% versus 29.0 ± 0.9%), and male fertility (pregnancy rate: 87.4 ± 1.1% versus 70.2 ± 6.1%) by benefiting blood and testicular metabolome. A10-FMT improved HFD-disturbed gut microbiota by increasing gut Bacteroides (colon: 24.9 ± 1.1% versus 8.3 ± 0.6%; cecum: 10.2 ± 0.7% versus 3.6 ± 0.7%) and decreasing Mucispirillum (colon: 0.3 ± 0.1% versus 2.8 ± 0.4%; cecum: 2.3 ± 0.5% versus 6.6 ± 0.7%). A10-FMT benefited gut microbiota to improve liver function by adjusting lipid metabolism to produce n-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids, such as eicosapentaenoic acid (blood: 55.5 ± 18.7 versus 20.3 ± 2.4) and docosahexaenoic acid (testis: 121.2 ± 6.2 versus 89.4 ± 6.7), thus ameliorating HFD-impaired testicular microenvironment to rescue spermatogenesis and increase semen quality and fertility. The findings indicated that AOS-improved gut microbiota may be a promising strategy to treat obesity or metabolic issues-related male infertility in the future.

Item Type:	Journal Article
Murdoch Affiliation(s):	College of Science, Health, Engineering and Education
Publisher:	American Society for Microbiology
Copyright:	© 2022 Hao et al.
URI:	http://researchrepository.murdoch.edu.au/id/eprint/64702

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