Overview
- The Cornell team, whose study published Tuesday in PNAS, showed that blocking a step of meiosis in male mice can pause sperm production and then allow it to return.
- The researchers used the small molecule JQ1 to disrupt prophase I, and three weeks of dosing led to no sperm in the mice.
- After treatment stopped, most meiotic markers and sperm production recovered within six weeks, and the treated males fathered healthy, fertile offspring.
- JQ1 is a research tool with neurological side effects that rule it out for human use, so the group is advancing three gene targets that shut down meiosis in mice with the aim of reversible control.
- The work remains preclinical, but it points to a potential new option for men who today have only condoms or vasectomy.