Poor male reproductive health leads to nearly half of failed pregnancy attempts. Declining semen quality over the past 50 years indicates the role of changing lifestyle and exposure to environmental and toxic components as potential contributing factors. Sperm retrieval is feasible in adult infertile men like azoospermic patients, by using surgical procedures like TESE (Testicular sperm extraction) or by cryopreserving semen samples for future ART treatments. In addition to adult infertile men, there is a large cohort of immature boys like prepubertal cancer survivors who undergo gonadotoxic treatment and patients with genetic abnormalities like Klinefelter patients, who are at a very high risk of losing their fertility. Such patients have no option to father their biological children in the future, thus fertility clinics are cryo-banking testicular biopsies from these immature boys with a hope to offer fertility preservation approaches to enable them to produce their own biological children. Thus, this Research Topic focuses on research advances in the field of fertility preservation and the development of strategies to investigate the impact of environmental factors on male reproductive health.

Keeping in view the research needs for clinical fertility preservation (i.e., to achieve ex vivo spermatogenesis), it is necessary to develop new strategies to generate ex vivo testicular models. Two-dimensional and three-dimensional organoid and organ culture models employing cell and tissue-based strategies have been successfully established for non-primate species. None of these strategies could be successfully applied to generate primate testicular models or to achieve ex vivo primate spermatogenesis using either immature or mature testicular tissue from humans and non-human primates (including marmoset and macaque monkeys). This Research Topic focuses on the application of innovative research strategies to mimic various stages of primate spermatogenesis and investigate the impact of environmental toxins on testicular germ cell and niche function.

Special attention will be given to the following sub-topics:
• in vitro spermatogenesis including human and non-human primates,
• developing pre-clinical strategies for fertility preservation including ex vivo culture and transplantation approaches,
• development of new methods including bio-engineered organoid models, 3D printed or microfluidic-based miniature systems/platforms and technologies to investigate testicular biology and function,
• investigation on the role of testicular somatic cells and testicular niche in influencing primate germ cell function,
• role of endocrine axis in influencing testicular differentiation,
• role of animal models in research investigating male reproductive function.

Authors are welcome to submit original research articles, review articles, mini review articles, and commentaries within the scope of this Research Topic.

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Frontiers in Endocrinology

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