IMP students characterise a sperm protein essential for zebrafish fertilisation

During fertilisation, egg and sperm rely on a host of membrane proteins to bind and fuse. Two students at the IMP examined the function of Spaca6 – a sperm protein essential for fertilisation in mice – in zebrafish sperm. The scientists found that Spaca6 is also crucial for sperm-egg binding in fish, and that it may act in concert with other sperm proteins. Their findings are now reported in Frontiers in Cell and Developmental Biology.