Abstract
Basic computer-aided sperm analysis (CASA) was first developed in the 1980s to track sperm motion. However, like all applications of information technology, considerable advances were made during the 1990s and 2000s. Although CASA was found to have limitations in a clinical setting, it was especially useful for research applications in human and animal studies. Today, CASA systems have improved significantly and are considered a reliable and objective research and diagnostic instrument in the medical and veterinary laboratories and in field animal studies. Due to these improvements, current CASA systems are user-friendly, fast and able to produce vast amounts of data, not only for sperm motility (including kinematics), concentration, but also improved imaging for sperm morphology. Additionally, certain systems are able to assess a number of other parameters related to sperm functionality including DNA fragmentation. This is very useful for epidemiology and reproductive toxicology studies, as evidenced in the number of publications on the use of CASA systems for human and animal sperm analysis.
Most importantly, CASA systems differ with respect to settings and technical conditions for recording. Therefore, attention should be given to the individual parameters and settings in order to avoid erroneous conclusions. Differences in results may be due to system operator error; therefore, the individual should be well versed and trained in CASA technology. While there are a number of systems available, the Hamilton Thorne and SCA Microptic are two widely used systems.
The Andrology lab, in the Environmental Chemical Pollution and Health Research Unit at the University of Pretoria, has used both CASA systems in the assessing sperm kinematics in a human epidemiology study in the Limpopo Province South Africa. The Hamilton Thorne system was used in the early 2000s (2003–2005) and the SCA Microptic system from 2012 to assess additional sperm parameters. It was also used in a rat reproductive toxicology study to analyse on rat sperm morphology.
CASA has developed significantly in the past three decades and the number of applications is continuously been improved. Studies highlighted in this paper show that it is a suitable tool to assess sperm concentration, motility, kinematics and morphology and eventually sperm functional assessments, and perhaps even incorporating molecular biological aspects of sperm analysis.
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Acknowledgements
The Male reproductive health study was funded by the Medical Research Council (SA), the National Research Foundation (NRF) SA. Thanks to Ms. Alta Koch from Lancet laboratories; and Prof Gerhard Van Der Horst from University of the Western Cape for their assistance and training on the SCA Microptic system. Mrs. Sokhna Dieng from University Aix-Marseille for the statistical analysis. The Organising Committee of Spermatology XIII for inviting me as a speaker at the conference.
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Aneck-Hahn, N.H., Patrick, S.M., Matjomane, N.K., Bornman, M.S., de Jager, C. (2021). CASA: A Suitable Tool for Epidemiology and Reprotox Studies. In: Björndahl, L., Flanagan, J., Holmberg, R., Kvist, U. (eds) XIIIth International Symposium on Spermatology. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-66292-9_29
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