Chlamydia trachomatis infection in the genital tract is associated with inflammation and hypospermia in the infertile male of China

Abstract

Chlamydia trachomatis (CT) infection is the most prevalent sexually transmitted bacterial disease worldwide. However, unlike that in female infertility, the role of CT infection in male infertility remains controversial. The objective of this retrospective study was to explore the impacts of CT infection in the genital tract on sperm quality, sperm acrosin activity, antisperm antibody levels, and inflammation in a large cohort of infertile males in China. A total of 7154 semen samples were collected from infertile male subjects, 416 of whom were CT positive (CT+ group) and 6738 of whom were CT negative (CT− group), in our hospital between January 2016 and December 2018. Routine semen parameters (semen volume, pH, sperm concentration, viability, motility, morphology, etc.), granulocyte elastase levels, antisperm antibody levels, and sperm acrosin activity were compared between the CT+ and CT− groups. Our results showed that CT infection was significantly correlated with an abnormally low semen volume, as well as an increased white blood cell count and granulocyte elastase level (all P < 0.05) in the semen of infertile males; other routine semen parameters were not negatively impacted. The antisperm antibody level and sperm acrosin activity were not affected by CT infection. These findings suggested that CT infection might contribute to inflammation and hypospermia but does not impair sperm viability, motility morphology, and acrosin activity or generate antisperm antibodies in the infertile males of China.

Sperm DNA integrity is critically impacted by male age but does not influence outcomes of artificial insemination by husband in the Chinese infertile couples

“…In addition, Sugihara et al found that a therapeutic algorithm integrating sperm DNA integrity could help couples with unexplained infertility decide the treatment method and elevate the chances of successful pregnancy following IUI [ 34 ]. Our previous studies proved that cycle treatment options, single/double IUI, female age, and certain sperm parameters could predict AIH outcomes in China [ 35 , 36 ]. In the current investigation, we did not identify any predictive value of sperm DFI and HDS for the AIH outcomes, which might be due to the optimized semen treatment that probably removed differences between the sperm DFI and HDS.…”

Enterotypes in asthenospermia patients with obesity

“…What’s more, sperm quality has been demonstrated to be related to male genital tract inflammation 27 . Previous studies have reported that genital tract inflammation are associated with asthenozoospermia 27 , 28 , and a study of leukocytospermic showed sperm motility is affected by inflammation 29 . The microbiome of male with leukocytospermic differed from that of normal population 29 .…”

Application of Induced Pluripotent Stem Cell-Derived Models for Investigating microRNA Regulation in Developmental Processes

“…In humans, genetic information is passed on to their offspring via germ cells (Luo et al, 2021b;Zhou et al, 2022). At present, ESCs, iPSCs and spermatogonial stem cells are the major cell sources used for generation of male germ cells expressing functional genes (Saito et al, 2015).…”