The Life Scientific is a long-standing BBC Radio 4 show, where host, Professor Jim Al-Khalili, speaks with leading scientists about their life and work, with a focus on what inspires and motivates them. This episode welcomes Professor Chris Barratt, the head of reproductive medicine at Ninewells Hospital and the University of Dundee Medical School, and leading scientist working on issues relating to male infertility.
As covered previously in BioNews (see BioNews 1155) the format of the programme allows listeners to build a fairly decent foundation of knowledge based on the expertise and knowledge of both guest and host. We learn about the pivotal moments in Professor Barratt's life and professional trajectory, which is both interesting and reassuring to those of us who may discover their area of interest later on in their education or career.
In introducing the episode, Professor Al-Khalil outlines the importance of breakthroughs associated with fertility treatment. He draws attention to procedures such as IVF and egg freezing, as examples of implicitly 'known' examples of assisted reproductive technologies. Indeed, such technology is almost embedded within our social schema as available options for either couples seeking assistance with conception, or individuals wishing to preserve their fertility. What is unspoken, however, is the gendered nature of the current landscape: that the vast majority of existing treatments are geared at treating female factor infertility, and as such, both the burden and responsibility for either conception, or its prevention, falls on women alone. This is where Professor Barratt enters the room.
As Professor Al-Khalil explains, Professor Barratt has dedicated his career to better understanding male infertility. We learn about the two major tenets of his research: first, working to better understand sperm dysfunction; and second, working on advances in developing a male contraceptive pill.
Most probably owing to his background in teaching (he tells us he completed a PGCE before his PhD) Professor Barratt is an excellent communicator. He switches seamlessly between providing quippy anecdotes about his childhood and upbringing, and 'unpacking' the science behind his research. The episode takes us through the lecture on fertilisation that 'ignited' his interest in reproductive sciences, to a heartfelt reflection on the importance of his mentor, the late Dr Jack Cohen, who he maintains has had the single biggest influence on his life. He proceeds to effortlessly explain the science behind his PhD work which focused on sperm selection and examining how sperm behaved in the fallopian tube.
Carrying on the work of his mentor, Professor Barratt started with the hypothesis that the fallopian tube contains a special 'selection' mechanism. He explains that Dr Cohen had found that when inseminating rabbits with sperm already recovered from the fallopian tube, these sperm had actually fertilised the egg when used for insemination again, despite being outnumbered by ejaculated sperm cells. Professor Barratt then went on to further this hypothesis of a special sperm selection mechanism from the point of view of the male reproductive tract within his doctoral research. The episode then carries on with a whistle-stop tour of the rest of his career: from an atypical postdoc, to working with the World Health Organisation on male fertility, to developing the first 'at home' sperm analysis tests that he explains, work like lateral flow tests, which we are all familiar with now.
Professor Al-Khalili and Professor Barratt then bring the topic of male infertility and male contraception together. To me, this is the most interesting part of the episode. Professor Barratt explains his research into what 'signals' are communicated to sperm in the female reproductive tract. Briefly, his work explored the 'CatSper' ion channel within sperm, which allows an influx of calcium into the sperm tail, which may in turn control the movement of the sperm. As such, Professor Barrett considered whether an interruption of the CatSper channel could either point to a diagnosis of infertility or, be used as a form of male-controlled contraception. Ongoing research into the latter, he explains, is now being funded by a range of sources, including the Gates Foundation.
At the end of the episode, Professor Barratt frames male infertility and male contraception as 'the flipside of the same coin.' This is a highly interesting framing, given that conception and the prevention of it, are diametrically opposed processes in common understanding. But for him, the beauty lies in the potential of learning from one to aid the other: that learning what causes infertility in males may lead to the development of stopping fertility in sperm cells for contraceptive purposes. This framing made me consider the mechanics behind the idea of male contraception, something I had not previously thought about. While Professor Barratt does argue that the introduction of a 'male pill' may work to relieve the sole burden of reproduction from women, he fails to grapple with the social implications of its introduction. This to me seems particularly pressing given the current political climate surrounding abortion access and legality. This, however, is obviously outside the remit of both his expertise and the episode.
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