Stemming Sperm

Male mammals, including humans and mice, are always producing sperm. These swimming sex cells are made from continually dividing stem cells, found in small tubes in the testes. Many genes and molecules need to work together to keep stem cells functioning properly, maintaining their immortality so they can constantly make new sperm. These images show cells from the testis of two different adult male mice, seen down a microscope. The DNA of the cells is stained with a fluorescent blue dye, while sperm stem cells are highlighted red. The mouse on the left is normal, but the one on the right has a fault in a gene called Dmrt1. There are hardly any stem cells, so it can’t make sperm and is infertile. Some men also suffer from this kind of infertility, so figuring out the molecular processes at work could provide new solutions to enable them to become fathers.

Written by Kat Arney

Kat Arney

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Dr Kat Arney is an award-winning science writer, broadcaster and public speaker, and is the founder and Creative Director of First Create The Media.

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• Image from work by Teng Zhang and colleagues
• Developmental Biology Center and Department of Genetics, Cell Biology, and Development, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN, USA
• Image originally published under a Creative Commons Licence (BY 4.0)
• Published in PLOS Genetics, September 2016