The Aging Sperm: Is the Male Reproductive Capacity Ticking to Biological Extinction?

Abstract

In other to provide some insight into the issue of male fertility with aging, several experimental, clinical and cross‑sectional epidemiological studies have been undertaken to characterize the relationship between paternal ages as a marker of the semen quality and male fertility status. The present review summarizes, comprehensively, the mechanisms that tend to relate male aging and semen quality with their consequences on semen parameters. Review of English language‑published research articles from 1980, through 2013 was executed using Medline and Medscape databases. It was found that the semen volume, concentration and vitality of spermatozoa declined significantly with age. Deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) fragmentations, as well as abnormalities of sex chromosomes, were also reported as having a significant association with men’s age which may be one of the reasons for failure in some traditional in vitro fertilization (IVF) cycles.

Keywords: Deoxyribonucleic acid fragmentation, male infertility, paternal age, semen quality, sperm count