New Insights in the TSSK Family: Studies in the Activity and Function of the Testis Specific Serine Kinases

• Main Author: Sosnik, Julian
• Format: Others
• Published: ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst 2010
• Subjects: Capza3; Gamete Fusion; Izumo; Kinase; Mouse sperm; Tssk; Cell Biology
• Online Access: https://scholarworks.umass.edu/open_access_dissertations/160; https://scholarworks.umass.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1160&context=open_access_dissertations

The Testis Specific Serine Kinase (Tssk) family of proteins is a large group of kinases that present high level of conservation within paralogs, as well as within species. In addition, in all reported cases as well as in the analysis of expressed sequence tags available in databases, this family of proteins presents a very strict pattern of either testicular or male-gonadal expression. This high level of conservation prompted the postulate that these kinases ought to be important for either testicular function or fertilization. In this work we attempt a biochemical characterization of one family member (Tssk6) in the mouse. We also analyze the male infertility phenotype presented by mice null for Tssk6 revealing its requirement for actin dynamics and the relocalization of proteins necessary for gamete fusion. In this analysis we described Tssk6 as the second protein known to date to be necessary in the sperm for gamete fusion to take place. We also examined a novel member of the Tssk family in the mouse as well as ortholog proteins in two invertebrates (C. elegans and D. melanogaster). Although our understanding of the function, activity and regulation of these kinases remains small, this work constitutes a significant advance towards the understanding of the identity of the Tssk family. The results that follow have far reaching effects that surpass the realm of the Tssk family. They influence the study of sperm biological processes like the changes in sperm cytoskeletal structures and the acrosome reaction. They also influence the field of developmental biology and scientist working in the molecular characterization of the process of gamete fusion and zygote formation. Lastly, the work here presented influences as well evolutionary developmental biology through the study of a highly conserved family of proteins that is essential for reproduction and could play a role in the process of speciation.