Current progress in single sperm cryopreservation / 中华男科学杂志

Sperm cryopreservation has been widely used in assisted reproduction, but conventional techniques are not suitable for the cryopreservation of small numbers of sperm. The application of the single sperm cryopreservation technique has significantly improved the clinical treatment of cryptozoospermia and non-obstructive azoospermia. Ever since Cohen et al first developed the method of single sperm cryopreservation in 1997, constant efforts have been made to develop the carriers for this technique. In this review, we mainly discuss the existing methods and clinical outcomes of single sperm cryopreservation.

Impact of sperm midpiece morphology on embryo development following intracytoplasmic morphologically selected sperm injection / 南方医科大学学报

<p><b>OBJECTIVE</b>To evaluate the impact of sperm midpiece morphology observed under high-power microscope on embryo development following intracytoplasmic morphologically selected sperm injection.</p><p><b>METHODS</b>Morphologically normal sperms from 57 patients undergoing intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) for male-factor infertility were selected microscopically (magnification of ×200 or 400) and subjected to motile sperm organellar morphology examination (MSOME) at high magnification of ×6000. According to the morphology of sperm medpiece, the sperms were divided into 3 groups, namely group A with a/b of 1-1.2, group B with a/b≥1.5, and group C with irregular morphology. The sperms in the 3 groups were intracytoplasmically injected in oocytes and the outcomes of the embryos were compared.</p><p><b>RESULTS</b>Groups A, B, and C showed significant differences in the rate of ET-D3 top quality embryo (79.7% vs 55.6 % vs 33.3%) and implantation rate (43.2% vs 11.1% vs 0%), but not in the fertilization rate (73.3% vs 80.4% vs 63.5%), blastocyst formation rate (23.2% vs 22.2% vs 9.09%), cryopreservation rate (29.2% vs 25.0 % vs 13.0%), or D3 top quality embryo rate (35.3% vs 37.8% vs 18.8%).</p><p><b>CONCLUSIONS</b>In ICSI cycle, selecting morphologically normal sperms for intracytoplasic injection can increase the normal fertilization rate and top quality embryo rate on the transfer day and improve the implantation rate of the embryo.</p>

Intracytoplasmic injection of morphologically selected spermatozoa from patients with male factor infertility: clinical and embryo development outcomes / 南方医科大学学报

<p><b>OBJECTIVE</b>To test whether intracytoplasmic injection of morphologically selected spermatozoa (IMSI) from patients with male factor infertility can improve the clinical and embryo development outcomes of intracytoplasmic sperm injection-embryo transfer (ICSI-ET).</p><p><b>METHODS</b>We performed IMSI for 82 couples diagnosed with obstructive azoospermia at high magnification (×6600) and traditional ICSI for another 91 couples using testicular sperms. We also performed IMSI for 44 couples with teratozoospermia at high magnification (×6600) and traditional ICSI for 71 patients using ejaculated sperms. The clinical and embryo development outcomes were compared between the cycles.</p><p><b>RESULTS</b>For obstructive azoospermia, IMSI and ICSI showed no significant difference in the rates of cleavage (95.5% vs 96.7%), D3 top quality embryos (28.2% vs 29.2%), implantation (26.4% vs 32.3%), pregnancy (47.3% vs 50%), blastocyst formation (54.3% vs 54.6%), or abortion (14% vs 7.3%) (P>0.05), but a significantly higher normal fertilization rate was achieved in IMSI group (84.3% vs 77%, P<0.05). For teratozoospermia, the 2 techniques resulted in no significant differences in the rates of cleavage (96.2% vs 95.2%), D3 top quality embryo (27.6% vs 27.1%), implantation (28.2% vs 30.7%), pregnancy (43.7% vs 43.2%), or abortion (9.7% vs 10.5%) (P>0.05), but the normal fertilization rate (68% vs 75.5%) and the blastocyst formation rate (54.6% vs 67.9% ) were significantly higher in IMSI group (P<0.05).</p><p><b>CONCLUSION</b>IMSI can improve the normal fertilization rates in couples with male factor infertility (including obstructive azoospermia and teratozoospermia) and increase blastocyst formation rate in cases of azoospermia.</p>