Abstract

The study was designed to investigate the efficacy of treating the adult male rats with royal jelly (1g/kg B. Wt. orally) for one month with or without hydrogen peroxide (0.5%) in drinking water on sexual efficiency, glutathione and malondialdehyde tissue testis levels. The current study demonstrated that male rats receiving hydrogen peroxide caused a significant decrease (P<0.05) in the sperm count, percentage of live sperm and glutathione level, accompanied with a significant increase (P<0.05) in the malondialdehyde level and percentage of abnormal sperm deformity compared with control group. No significant difference was found in the weight of testis, epididymus, prostate, seminal vesicles, testosterone hormone level and body weight compared with control group. The treatment of adult male rats with royal jelly concomitantly with hydrogen peroxide caused a significant increase (P<0.05) in testicular weight and the body of epididymus, sperm count, testosterone hormone and glutathione level, and decrease in sperm deformity percentage, while no significant differences in the prostate weight, seminal vesicles, the percentage of live sperm, malondialdehyde level and body weight compared with hydrogen peroxide group. The treatment of adult male rats with royal jelly alone produced a significant increase (P<0.05) in the weights of testis and body of epididymus, sperm count, testosterone hormone, the percentage of live sperm, and glutathione level and retuned to control value, accompanied with a significant decrease (P<0.05) in malondialdehyde level and the percentage of sperm abnormality. It could be concluded from this study that royal jelly is a beneficial treatment of male adult rats receiving hydrogen peroxide (to induced oxidative stress) specially on sperm count, testosterone hormone level, the percentage of live sperm, and improvement of glutathione and malondialdehyde tissue testis.