Related Experiment Video
Updated: Apr 23, 2026
Flow Cytometric Analysis of Biomarkers for Detecting Human Sperm Functional Defects
Published on: April 21, 2022
Simultaneous vitality and DNA-fragmentation measurement in spermatozoa of smokers and non-smokers
A De Bantel1, J Fleury-Feith, C Poirot
1UPMC; AP-HP, Service de Biologie de la reproduction-CECOS; Hôpital Tenon, 4 rue de la Chine, Paris, France.
Background:
Because cigarette smoke is a powerful ROS producer, we hypothesized that the spermatozoa of smokers would be more at risk of having increased DNA fragmentation than spermatozoa of non-smoking men.
Methods:
A cross-sectional study was performed on consenting smokers and non-smokers, consulting in an infertility clinic for routine sperm analysis. The application of a novel TUNEL assay coupled to a vitality marker, LIVE/DEAD®, allowed both DNA fragmentation and viability measurement within spermatozoa of participants to be analyzed by flow cytometry.
Results:
The coupled vitality-DNA fragmentation analysis revealed that non-smokers and smokers, respectively presented medians of 3.6% [0.6-36.8] and 3.3% [0.9-9.6] DNA fragmented spermatozoa among the living spermatozoa population (P > 0.05).
Conclusion:
No deleterious effect of smoking on spermatozoa was found in our study. More studies concerning potential mutagenic capacities of cigarette smoke on spermatozoa are necessary. In addition, the coupled vitality-DNA fragmentation analysis may orient Assisted Reproductive Technology teams when confronted with patients having a high percentage of DNA-fragmented living spermatozoa.
