Deoxyribonucleic acid methylation signatures in sperm deoxyribonucleic acid fragmentation

ObjectiveTo evaluate Deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) methylation patterns in sperm from men with differential levels of DNA fragmentation index (DFI).DesignProspective study.SettingUniversity-affiliated reproductive medicine center.Patient(s)A total 278 male patients consulting for couple infertility were recruited the First Affiliated Hospital Wenzhou Medical University.Intervention(s)None.Main Outcome Measure(s)Genome-wide analysis was performed using Infinium MethylationEPIC BeadChip on spermatozoal 20 patients. Differentially methylated regions (DMRs) identified and validated targeted bisulfite amplicon sequencing 266 males.Result(s)Unsupervised hierarchical clustering revealed three main clusters corresponding to DFI (low, medium, or high). Between-cluster comparisons 959 (medium–low), 738 (high–medium), 937 (high–low) DMRs. Sixty-six DMRs 266-sample cohort, which nine CpG fragments genes (BLCAP, DIRAS3, FAM50B, GNAS, MEST, TSPAN32, PSMA8, SYCP1, TEX12) exhibited significantly altered those high (≥25%) compared low (<25%).Conclusion(s)We a distinct signature associated damage large, unselected cohort. These results indicate that may affect human sperm. To (DFI). Prospective study. University-affiliated center. A University. None. Genome-wide males. Unsupervised (<25%). We