Cryopreservation of rabbit semen: effectiveness of different permeable and non-permeable cryoprotectants on post-thaw sperm quality and reproductive performances

The higher values (P?0.05) of motile and progressively moving spermatozoa immediately after thawing and at 30 min following incubation at 37°C were obtained in the Ficoll group. Moreover, the higher number (P?0.05) of acrosome intact sperm was found in the Ficoll compared to control group. Furthermore, no significant differences in kindling rates and number of pups born between frozen/thawed and fresh semen group were found. In conclusion, this study showed that the addition of the Ficoll 70 might improve several characteristic of rabbit spermatozoa measured in vitro following freezing/thawing. These researches were important because we have been able to find effective cryopreservation protocols, that showed similar reproductive performances compared to use of fresh semen. These findings provide direction for future studies designed to address the possibility of using doses of frozen semen for the artificial insemination of rabbits in commercial farms. Moreover, the use of frozen semen will be attractive to the establishment of a gene bank from national or endangered rabbit breeds as gene resources.