The cattleyak are the hybrid offspring between cattle and yak and combine yak hardiness with cattle productivity in Tibet and in China. Milk yield is higher in F1 hybrids than in the pure yak and often higher than in the local types of cattle. However male are sterile due to spermatogenic arrest. By testis transcriptome profiling Wu et al. (2020) have recently identified that AKAP4 is among the gene that are the most drastically downregulated in the hybrid male cattleyak.

ProAKAP4/AKAP4 system is a vital for flagellar development and motily and both proAKAP4 and AKAP4 consist of more of 50% of the axonem.

The proAKAP4/AKAP4 is required for fertility as spermotoza with no or low amount of proAKAP4/AKAP4 are immature, abnormal and/or immortile (Miki et al. 2008 ; Xu et al. 2020 ; Fang et al. 2019).

The proAKAP4 concentrations (stock of full length AKAP4) are the unique sperm parameter that have correlated with fertility in main mammals including bovine (Sergeant et al. 2019 ; Ruelle et al. 2019 ;Peddinti et al. 2008 ; Singh et al. 2019 ; Delehedde et al. 2019)

The 4MID® Kit,  are today the only functional assays on the market that allow to quantify proAKAP4 concentration directly in ejaculates or straws, assessing the sperm quality and how spermatozoa will be functional and living in time.

More details about this new approach in sperm analysis with the 4MID® Kits and their different applications on www.4biodx-breeding.com

Please contact us at contact@4biodx.com if you require further information ¡