Epididymal protein secretion and its androgenic control in wall lizards Hemidactylus flaviviridis (Ruppell).

ABSTRACT

The total protein level in different segments of epididymis of normal lizard exhibited noticeable increase from early February to late March of a same reproductive phase. Comparison among the protein level of different epididymal segments showed insignificant variation from anterior to posterior part in early February but in late March, the protein level in posterior segment was appreciably higher than in anterior and middle segments. Further, testosterone-induced epididymal protein did not exhibit any significant quantitative variation among different regions. The electrophoretic pattern of luminal fluid from different epididymal regions of normal lizard showed 28 protein bands without any marked regional difference. However, only 16 protein bands could be demonstrated in the epididymal fluid of any region. Unlike molecular size, isoelectric focussing of testosterone induced epididymal proteins revealed that three regions of epididymis differ in their nature of protein. The number of proteins having alkaline pH range in anterior and middle regions were 4 and 3, respectively which increased upto 6 in posterior region.