Introduction

Infertility affects 7% of men worldwide, and artificial intelligence can help solve this problem.

Artificial Intelligence Detects Sperm Faster

Researchers at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS) in Australia have developed an artificial intelligence system that can detect sperm in samples taken from men with severe infertility faster than trained experts.

SpermSearch System

The system, called SpermSearch, works by analyzing images of sperm samples and identifying healthy sperm.

This is done in seconds, compared with the six or seven hours it may take an embryologist to manually search for viable sperm.

“SpermSearch can identify potentially viable sperm before people can even process what they’re looking at,” explained Dr Stephen Vasilescu, founder of healthcare company NeoGenix Biosciences and research leader at the University of Technology Sydney, which developed the software.

Assisting Men with Non-Obstructive Azoospermia

It is designed to help men who have no sperm at all ejaculate, a condition called non-obstructive azoospermia (NOA), which affects 10% of infertile men.

In these cases, a small portion of the testicle is surgically removed and the embryologist manually looks for healthy sperm in the laboratory.

This procedure involves the tedious process of separating tissues from each other and examining them under a microscope. If viable sperm are found, they can be retrieved and injected into the egg.

Training SpermSearch

SpermSearch was trained to quickly identify sperm in these complex tissue samples by displaying thousands of such images.

In a recent scientific paper, a team of biomedical engineers from the University of Technology Sydney described the sperm retrieval test as 1,000 times faster than a test performed by an experienced embryologist.

AI is not intended to replace embryologists, but to assist them, thereby increasing the chances of success by reducing fatigue and inaccuracy.

Potential for Revolutionizing Infertility Treatment

Although the artificial intelligence system is still in the early stages of development, it has the potential to revolutionize infertility treatment by reducing treatment time and cost.

However, SpermSearch is currently still in the proof-of-concept stage, with only seven patients enrolled in the very small study.

Source

Source: Metro