Biol Reprod Keystone Symposia Conference on Frontiers in Reproductive Biology & Regulation of Fertility.
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Biology of Reproduction, Vol 12, 556-565, Copyright © 1975 by Society for the Study of Reproduction

Preliminary Characterization of Rabbit Oviduct Fluid Trypsin Inhibitors

KEITH C. McLAUGHLIN 1, and CHARLES E. HAMNER 1

1 Division of Reproductive Biology, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, University of Virginia Medical School, Charlottesville, Virginia 22901


This study has shown rabbit oviduct fluid to contain trypsin inhibitors with properties similar to those of the trypsin inhibitors present in various mammalian blood sera, including rabbit blood serum. The concentration of oviduct fluid trypsin inhibitor (OFTI) activity varied with the hormonal state of the animal. For five estrous rabbits, the average inhibitor level was 475 inhibitor milli-units (ImU)/ml of oviduct fluid. However, seven days after ovulation, the level had risen to 800 ImU/ml. After this, the concentration declined to nearly estrous levels as pseudopregnancy progressed. In four ovariectomized rabbits, estrogen treatment (1 µg/kg body wgt/day for 5 days) caused a sharp decrease in total inhibitor level, a drop from 800 to 400 ImU/ml. A progesterone regimen (1 mg/kg body wgt/day) for 7 days following the estrogen therapy raised the inhibitor level to 640 ImU/ml. In neither experiment did blood serum trypsin inhibitor (BSTI) activity exhibit such fluctuations. In both experiments, however, oviduct fluid protein concentration fluctuated similarly to OFTI levels.

Evidence is presented for the presence of at least four inhibitors in the oviductal fluid. The inhibitor activity in whole oviduct fluid was heat and acid labile and could not pass through a dialysis membrane. It was destroyed by pronase and partially destroyed by beta-glucuronidase, but was unaffected by neuraminidase, agr-amylase, or hyaluronidase.

OFTI and BSTI activities behaved similarly with regard to their G-200 elution profiles and chemical sensitivities. beta-glucuronidase, however, was not able to destroy BSTI activity after addition of whole blood serum.

 Accepted on February 3, 1975






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Copyright © 1975 by the Society for the Study of Reproduction.