Effect of age on testicular germ cell apoptosis and sperm aneuploidy in MF-1 mice.

The spontaneous mutation rate in the male germ-line increases with age. The reason for this is unknown, but presumably involves an age-related degeneration in the efficacy of cellular processes. To investigate the possibility that rates of apoptosis and genetic damage (represented by aneuploidy) might vary with age in mice, the testes and sperm of 2- and 12-month-old male MF-1 mice were examined by a modified TUNEL technique and 3-colour sperm-FISH assay, respectively. Sperm were labeled with probes to chromosomes 8, X and Y and 20,000 sperm scored from each of 5 animals per group. A significant increase in gonosomal disomy was found in the aged mice, especially X-X-8. This suggests that advanced paternal age is associated primarily with meiosis II rather than meiosis I disjunction errors. Neither diploidy nor autosomal disomy was affected in the older group. The rate of germ cell apoptosis (apoptotic cells per seminiferous tubule cross-section per animal per group) was higher in the old mice than controls, but not significantly. Considerable inter-animal variability was observed in the older group. The finding of an increase in levels of sperm aneuploidy is novel for 1-year-old mice and confirms the genotoxic effect of ageing in mice. Since apoptosis is assumed to eliminate cells with unrepaired damage, it may be that the apoptotic response in older mice is compromised, resulting in the higher levels of aneuploidy in sperm. However, given the inter-animal variability in testicular germ cell apoptosis, this awaits confirmation.