Abstract
The X-linked gene Rlim plays major roles in female mouse development and reproduction, where it is crucial for the maintenance of imprinted X chromosome inactivation in extraembryonic tissues of embryos. However, while females carrying a systemic Rlim knockout (KO) die around implantation, male Rlim KO mice appear healthy and are fertile. Here we report an important role for Rlim in testis where it is highly expressed in post-meiotic round spermatids as well as in Sertoli cells. Systemic deletion of the Rlim gene results in lower numbers of mature sperm that contains excess cytoplasm, leading to decreased sperm motility and in vitro fertilization rates. Targeting the conditional Rlim cKO specifically to the spermatogenic cell lineage largely recapitulates this phenotype. These results reveal functions of Rlim in male reproduction specifically in round spermatids during spermiogenesis.
Data availability
RNAseq data have been deposited in GEO under accession code GSE114593.
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Analysis of functions of Rlim during reproduction in male miceNCBI Gene Expression Omnibus, GSE114593.
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RNA-Seq and RNA Polymerase II ChIP-Seq of mouse spermatogenesisNCBI Gene Expression Omnibus, GSE44346.
Article and author information
Author details
Funding
National Institutes of Health (GM128168)
- Ingolf Bach
National Institutes of Health (HD080224)
- Oliver J Rando
National Institutes of Health (HD38082)
- Pablo E Visconti
The funders had no role in study design, data collection and interpretation, or the decision to submit the work for publication.
Ethics
Animal experimentation: All mice were housed in the animal facility of UMMS and utilized according to NIH guidelines and those established by the UMMS Institute of Animal Care and Usage Committee (IACUC; protocol #201900344).
Reviewing Editor
- Jeannie T Lee, Massachusetts General Hospital, United States
Publication history
- Received: September 29, 2020
- Accepted: February 22, 2021
- Accepted Manuscript published: February 23, 2021 (version 1)
- Accepted Manuscript updated: February 24, 2021 (version 2)
- Version of Record published: March 5, 2021 (version 3)
Copyright
© 2021, Wang et al.
This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License permitting unrestricted use and redistribution provided that the original author and source are credited.
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