ObjectiveTo investigate the correlation between the single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) rs662 of the paraoxonase 1 gene (PON1) and the risk of male infertility.

METHODSThis case-control study included 403 male idiopathic infertility patients aged 29.00 ± 4.48 years in the case group and 329 normal fertile men aged 28.28 ± 4.08 years as healthy controls. We obtained DNA from the peripheral venous blood of the subjects, genotyped the SNP rs662 of PON1 by Sequenom MassArray, and analyzed the association between different genotypes of PON1 rs662 and male infertility using the logistic regression model.

RESULTSCompared with the normal controls, the infertility patients showed a significantly increased level of follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH) (［16.30 ± 17.76］ vs ［4.72 ± 2.51］ U/L, P < 0.01) but a decreased percentage of progressively motile sperm (PMS) (［7.40 ± 14.17］ % vs ［41.93 ± 9.06］ %, P < 0.01) and sperm concentration (［2.74 ± 3.64］ vs ［75.83 ± 63.66］ ×10⁶/ml, P < 0.01). Statistically significant differences were not found in the other parameters between the two groups of subjects, nor in the correlation of male infertility with the heterozygous genotype GA versus the wild homozygous genotype GG (OR = 0.98, 95% CI: 0.63－1.53, P = 0.923) or the homozygous genotype AA versus the wild homozygous genotype GG (OR = 0.87, 95% CI: 0.56－1.34, P = 0.525).

CONCLUSIONSThe SNP rs662 of PON1 was not correlated with male infertility, which, however, needs to be confirmed by further studies with larger samples from a larger area.