Scientists develop algorithm that can spot healthiest sperm – and it could make IVF cheaper!
Scientists have developed an artificial intelligence that can scan sperm to find out which ones are the healthiest.
Even in men who eat well and exercise regularly, barely one in ten sperm cells is healthy – and in some men the ratio drops below four percent.
However, at California’s Oma Clinic, scientists have developed a “sperm health test” algorithm that scans swimmers for their shape and how they move to pick the best out of the crowd for fertilizing an egg.
They hope it will increase success rates with in vitro fertilization (IVF) and lower costs, meaning couples will need fewer rounds of treatment.
To develop the algorithm, the scientists started by extracting a subset of sperm from each sample – which contained up to 20,000 swimmers. They then placed the samples under a microscope and analyzed the health of each
A healthy sperm cell has a smooth and oval-shaped head and will also be able to swim quickly and in a straight line, but doctors behind the AI said finding these swimmers is often like looking for a ‘needle in a haystack’
Dr. Kiran Joshi, an entrepreneur who helped develop the AI, told DailyMail.com: ‘As it stands, couples have to go through an average of three IVF cycles.
“We want to reduce that number because that reduces the pain and reduces the financial burden and leads to more success.”
About 40 percent of infertility cases are due to the male partner, studies suggest, with sperm counts having been in free fall for decades — a pattern attributed to the rise of poor diets and sedentary lifestyles.
Dr. Joshi explained to this website that the algorithm was built by scanning sperm from the ejaculates of more than 1,000 men.
The samples were submitted by fertility clinics in the US and other countries and mostly came from men between the ages of 30 and 40, though they were up to 75 years old.
To develop the algorithm, the scientists started by extracting a subset of sperm from each sample – which contained up to 20,000 swimmers.
Top embryologists then placed the samples under a microscope and analyzed the health of each.
They were judged based on two factors: their shape and how well they swim.
A healthy sperm cell has a smooth and oval-shaped head and will also be able to swim quickly and in a straight line.
But Dr Joshi said finding these swimmers is often like looking for a “needle in a haystack.”
Dr. Explaining what it’s like to analyze a sample, Michael Guarnaccia, an embryologist who was also involved in the development of the AI, said: ‘We have sperm swimming in non-straight patterns, and sometimes we see sperm in circles or in a deviant way.’
The semen was assessed based on these two aspects using standardized measurements and a video of about ten seconds was then recorded.
This was then fed into the AI to give it the ability to accurately estimate how healthy a given sperm is.
When the AI is in use, it draws a box around each sperm and then quickly assigns a color based on the sperm’s perceived health.
Results are delivered in seconds – with red boxes indicating unhealthy sperm and green indicating healthy.
The scientists will publish their research in an academic journal in the coming months, although they cannot say in which journal.
They conducted tests to track the success rates of IVF rounds that used and did not use the technology.
At this stage, the researchers can’t reveal the results, but said there was a “significant” difference between the two groups.
Dr. Guarnaccia told DailyMail.com: ‘We have shown an increase in the rate of fertilization and the rate of advancing embryo development.
“There was a percentage increase in both the fertilization rate and the number of embryos that survived. That was statistically significant.’
The technology could represent a major step forward for the IVF industry, increasing conception rates and reducing the cost and time it takes for couples to go through the process and conceive.
It may also help scientists by giving them a second opinion, with some experts claiming it’s often a struggle to tell healthy sperm apart.
Each year in the United States, about 36,000 children are born through IVF, accounting for one percent of all births, according to estimates.
But this is a figure that continues to rise as more couples start families later in life. Estimates suggest that as many as half of all babies in the US will be born through IVF treatments by 2050.