Salidroside Mitigates Oligoasthenospermia by Attenuating Ferroptosis-mediated Lipid Peroxidation via NF-κB Pathway Inhibition

Aims: Oligoasthenozoospermia (OAS) causes male infertility. However, the etiology and pathogenesis of OAS are unclear, and specific therapy is lacking. Ferroptosis contributes to the progress of various diseases; however, its role in OAS is unknown. This study aimed to explore the mechanism of OAS and to find effective treatments. Results: Human OAS sperm exhibits biochemical and morphological hallmarks of ferroptosis. Ferroptosis represents a crucial role in OAS induced by cyclophosphamide (CP) of mice in vivo, and inhibiting ferroptosis can effectively improve OAS. Further search for safe, stable and clinically applicable of natural compounds found Salidroside （Sal）improved the sperm quality of OAS by attenuates ferroptosis-mediated lipid peroxidation in germ cells by increasing the expression of GPX4, and thus ameliorates OAS in vivo. To further investigate at which stage of spermatogenesis Sal acts, the result revealed that Sal increases the expression of GPX4 starting from primary spermatocytes gradually by immunohistochemistry. In vitro, we verified the above results in vivo using a mouse spermatocytes cell line, GC-2 cells. Mechanistically, integrated RNA-Seq and bioinformatic analysis showed that Sal likely promotes GPX4 expression by inhibiting NF-κB Pathway, thereby inhibiting ferroptosis. Innovation: Our findings support the view that ferroptosis plays an important role in patients with OAS, and provide convincing evidence that Sal ameliorates OAS by inhibiting ferroptosis-mediated lipid peroxidation via NF-κB pathway suppression. Conclusions: Thus, ferroptosis plays an important role in OAS, and Sal could ameliorate OAS by attenuating ferroptosis-mediated lipid peroxidation via NF-κB pathway inhibition.