A NEW MODEL OF BOAR SEMEN EVALUATION AND THE IMPACT OF CRYOGENIC FACTOR ON SPERMATIC CELLS

Nowadays, sperm evaluation is mostly used to predict fertility and freezability. Theaim of this study is to evaluate the possibility of investigating the effects of thecryogenic agent on boar spermatozoa, by identifying a set of laboratory tests for arapid and efficient evaluation of semen quality. Usual sperm analysis such as spermconcentration, motility and spermatozoa morphology are not able to show subtleabnormalities, which are having a basic role in the fertilizing ability. Moreover, itseems that other sperm characteristics, involved in the fertilizing ability, can interferewith the freezing-thawing processes, being not evaluated or maybe not known.Morphological (microscopic analysis of stained spermatozoa), functional (motilityanalysis and hypo-osmotic swelling test) and chromatin integrity (Acridine OrangeTest and Comet Assay) analysis were performed aiming to show the differences inspermatozoon integrity and functionality, caused by the cryogenic factor