ABSTRACT
Assisted reproductive technology (ART) was first used in the late 1970s and since its advent, more and more infertile couples have pursued this treatment to have a family. There are three common types of DNA damage that occur in sperm: 8-hydroxy-2'-deoxyguanosine (8OHdG) adducts, single-strand breaks (SSB), and double-strand breaks (DSB). DNA damage assays are widely used as sensitive toxicological tests in somatic cells and are often centered on monitoring the expression or DNA repair proteins in the nucleus. Sperm DNA quality is important at every stage of offspring development from fertilization onward. For clinical use, sperm DNA damage testing needs to be precise and repeatable, while remaining sensitive so the method is not limited by the number of sperm needed. Flow cytometry was developed in the 1970s for sorting cell populations using varied fluorescence probes in analyzing different properties of sperm. Fluorescence microscopy is an alternative analytical technique used to measure DNA fragmentation.
