Abstract
A clinically significant proportion of couples experience difficulty in conceiving a child. In about half of these cases male infertility is the cause and often genetic factors are involved. Despite advances in clinical diagnostics ∼50% of male infertility cases remain idiopathic. Based on this, further analysis of infertile males is required to identify new genetic factors involved in male infertility. This review focuses on cation channel of sperm (CATSPER)-related male infertility. It is based on PubMed literature searches using the keywords ‘CATSPER’, ‘male infertility’, ‘male contraception’, ‘immunocontraception’ and ‘pharmacologic contraception’ (publication dates from January 1979 to December 2009). Previously, contiguous gene deletions including the CATSPER2 gene implicated the sperm-specific CATSPER channel in syndromic male infertility (SMI). Recently, we identified insertion mutations of the CATSPER1 gene in families with recessively inherited nonsyndromic male infertility (NSMI). The CATSPER channel therefore represents a novel human male fertility factor. In this review we summarize the genetic and clinical data showing the role of CATSPER mutation in human forms of NSMI and SMI. In addition, we discuss clinical management and therapeutic options for these patients. Finally, we describe how the CATSPER channel could be used as a target for development of a male contraceptive.
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Acknowledgements
R Smith is the Sterba Hearing Research Professor, University of Iowa College of Medicine, supported financially by NIH grants RO1 DC03544, RO1 DC02842 and RO1 DK074409. M Hildebrand was supported by an Australian National Health and Medical Research (NHMRC) Postdoctoral Training Fellowship.
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MSH, MRA and MF designed the review; YZ, NCM, JA, CS, KK and HN compiled and analyzed clinical data; and MSH, MRA, MF, JSB and RJHS wrote the article.
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Hildebrand, M., Avenarius, M., Fellous, M. et al. Genetic male infertility and mutation of CATSPER ion channels. Eur J Hum Genet 18, 1178–1184 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1038/ejhg.2010.108
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/ejhg.2010.108
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