Abstract
The discovery and description of bioactive substances from natural sources has been a research topic for the last 50 years. In this respect, marine animals have been used to extract many new compounds exerting different actions. Reproduction is a complex process whose main steps are the production and maturation of gametes, their activation, the fertilisation and the beginning of development. In the literature it has been shown that many substances extracted from marine organisms may have profound influence on the reproductive behaviour, function and reproductive strategies and survival of species. However, despite the central importance of reproduction and thus the maintenance of species, there are still few studies on how reproductive mechanisms are impacted by marine bioactive drugs. At present, studies in either marine and terrestrial animals have been particularly important in identifying what specific fine reproductive mechanisms are affected by marine-derived substances. In this review we describe the main steps of the biology of reproduction and the impact of substances from marine environment and organisms on the reproductive processes.
Highlights
The gametes are formed during specific processes such as oogenesis and spermatogenesis, both characterized by a unique process of cell division occurring only in gametes, called meiosis, whose goal is the production of highly specialized haploid cells for fertilisation
In the majority of the species, the oocyte arrests at different stages of meiotic division, in particular the block occurring in the first meiotic prophase marks the state of immature oocyte characterized by a prominent nucleus called germinal vesicle (GV)
Meiosis is resumed in response to a stimulus that is different among the species and meiosis progression occurs with the germinal vesicle breakdown (GVBD)
Summary
Reproduction is the biological process by which new individual organisms are generated. The acrosome is an organelle located on the tip of the sperm head and due to the contact between ligand and receptors on the two gametes membranes undergoes the exocytosis [38] This process that is calcium-mediated allows the spermatozoon to cross the zona pellucida that surrounds the oocyte and to take contact with the oocyte plasma membrane, after that fusion of the gametes occurs [29]. A large volume of literature deals with developmental biology, this is a very complex step-by step process that is difficult to summarize [82,83]
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