Burak Evren Inanan, Fevzi Yilmaz
Boron (B) is required for organisms as an essential nutrient, whereas could be toxic in definite doses. In this study, for the first time, the effects of water-borne and food-borne B on fish sperm motility were initially determined and these sperm samples were cryopreserved in liquid nitrogen aiming to reveal how the quality of these samples are affected by cryopreservation. 12 mature male goldfish (Carassius auratus) individuals for each treatment performed in triplicate for 45 days were used in the study. Fish were fed with diets con-taining 1 mg, 5 mg and 10 mg of B per kg feed for foodborne experiments. In waterborne experiments, fish were kept in aquariums containing 1 mg/L, 10 mg/L and 20 mg/L of B. In both fresh and cryopreserved samples, the motility durations (s) and percentages of the sperm samples, vitality of spermatozoa (%) were determined. In the fresh samples, percentages of sperm motility and viability in the both B treatments de-creased compared to the control, while increasing B concentration. After cryopreservation, the sperm samples in 5 mg of B per kg feed treatment has shown higher duration of sperm motility. Therefore, it is shown that feed-borne B could improve sperm resistance to cold shock.