On February 14, 2024, the research teams led by Professor Wang Hua and Professor Xu Dexiang from the School of Public Health and Professor He Xiaojin and Professor Cao Yunxia from The First Affiliated Hospital of AHMU jointly published a research paper titled “Multigenerational paternal obesity enhances the susceptibility to male subfertility in offspring via Wt1 N6-methyladenosine modification” in Nature Communications (IF=16.6), a sub-journal of Nature. Professor Wang Hua, Professor Xu Dexiang, and Professor He Xiaojin from our university are co-corresponding authors of this paper, while Dr. Xiong Yongwei, Dr. Zhu Hualong, Dr. Zhang Jin from the School of Public Health, and Dr. Geng Hao from The First Affiliated Hospital of AHMU are co-first authors. Anhui Medical University is the first completion affiliation.
Based on the successful establishment of a paternal subfertility animal model, this project found that multigenerational paternal obesity increases the susceptibility to spermatogenic disorders in offspring. The research indicates that multigenerational paternal obesity enhances the susceptibility to spermatogenic disorders in offspring by downregulating Wt1 mRNA expression, and that METTL3-mediated m6A modification of sperm contributes to the reduction of Wt1 mRNA stability in the testes of offspring caused by paternal obesity. The findings provide empirical evidence for identifying epigenetic markers of impaired spermatogenesis in offspring due to the exposure of adverse paternal factors, and offer important references for developing early prevention and treatment strategies for paternal subfertility in the future.
Paper link: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-024-45675-4