Dundee robotics platform hunts male contraceptive

Described in eLife, the robotic screening platform uses a fast microscope and image-processing tools that precisely track the very fast movement of human sperm, allowing the effects of drugs to be accurately measured. The system was used to rapidly test the efficacy of the ReFRAME collection, one of the world's largest collections of previously approved and clinically tested drugs. Around 13,000 drugs were tested to gauge their impact on both the motility (movement) and acrosome reaction (essential for fertilisation) of human sperm.

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"The conventional way to test drugs for contraceptive activity is prohibitively time-consuming,” said Dr Paul Andrews, who leads the National Phenotypic Screening Centre (NPSC) in Dundee. "This new system speeds up the process of drug hunting several thousand-fold. The automated system also uses a different method to examine the effects of drugs on a second critical aspect required for fertilisation, called the acrosome reaction. This dual platform now allows for major drug discovery programmes that address the critical gap in the contraceptive portfolio as well as uncover novel human sperm biology.