OBJECTIVETo investigate the effect of sperm acrosin activity on the IVF-ET outcome.

METHODSWe analyzed sperm parameters, morphology and acrosin activity for 909 infertile husbands by computer-assisted self-assessment (CASA), modified Papanicolaou staining and N-alpha-benzoyl-DL-arginine-p-nitroanilide (BAPNA), respectively, and detected the rates of fertilization, cleavage, quality embryos, embryo cryopreservation, implantation, clinical pregnancy and abortion. The wives were identified as normal or with mere oviduct problems.

RESULTSThe rate of normal sperm morphology and sperm motility, vitality, rapid progressive velocity and concentration were significantly lower in the abnormal acrosin activity group than in the normal one (P < 0.01). Significant positive correlations were observed between acrosin activity and the above-mentioned semen parameters (P < 0.01). There were no significant differences in the number of retrieved eggs, the rates of cleavage, quality embryos, embryo cryopreservation, non-embryo transfer cycles and miscarriages, and the number of transferred embryos between the two groups (P > 0.05). The fertilization rate, the percentage of transfer cycles with only 1 embryo and the rate of implantation and clinical pregnancy were notably higher in the normal acrosin activity group than in the abnormal one (P < 0.01).

CONCLUSIONSperm acrosin activity is closely related with semen parameters, and it helps to predict the sperm fertilizing capacity and IVF-ET outcome.