{"id":403,"date":"2020-03-17T14:19:49","date_gmt":"2020-03-17T14:19:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/legacy.varunme.com\/resources\/using-stem-cells-to-preserve-male-fertility\/"},"modified":"2023-06-14T15:23:51","modified_gmt":"2023-06-14T15:23:51","slug":"using-stem-cells-to-preserve-male-fertility","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.givelegacy.com\/resources\/using-stem-cells-to-preserve-male-fertility\/","title":{"rendered":"Using stem cells to preserve male fertility"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"grid arx-grid-overlay\" data-arx-type=\"grid\" data-arx-first-level=\"true\">\n<div class=\"column column-6 arx-block-focus\" data-arx-type=\"column\">\n<p class=\"\" data-pm-slice=\"0 0 []\" data-arx-type=\"paragraph\"><strong>Key Takeaways: <\/strong><\/p>\n<ul data-rte-list=\"default\" data-arx-type=\"list\">\n<li>A new study shows that preserving testicular tissue for prepubescent men can be a way of fertility preservation<\/li>\n<li>New ways are being tested to prove the effectiveness of grafting previously frozen testicular tissue<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"column column-6\" data-arx-type=\"column\">\n<p class=\"\" data-pm-slice=\"0 0 []\" data-arx-type=\"paragraph\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.givelegacy.com\/resources\/chemotherapy-and-male-fertility-effects-and-defenses\/\">Medical treatments<\/a> for benign sickle cell disease, cancer, or the blood disorder known as thalassemia often come with side effects that can cause subfertility or, in some cases, permanent infertility in men.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\" data-arx-type=\"paragraph\">The effects on fertility can come about as a result of pediatric treatments that prove deleterious to a person\u2019s gonads. And while <a href=\"https:\/\/givelegacy.com\/resources\">cryogenic preservation of assets<\/a> is an option for adults undergoing medical treatments known to have negative impacts on fertility, this is not a viable avenue for prepubescent patients.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\" data-arx-type=\"paragraph\">Now, though, a new study published in the March 2019 journal <a href=\"https:\/\/science.sciencemag.org\/content\/363\/6433\/1283#login-pane\"><em>Science<\/em><\/a> indicates that removing and freezing testicular tissue containing <a href=\"https:\/\/www.givelegacy.com\/what-is-sperm\/\">sperm<\/a> cells could preserve a man\u2019s fertility \u2013 though, the study cautions, \u201cthere are currently no protocols available to derive sperm from the banked tissue\u201d.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\" data-arx-type=\"paragraph\"><strong>Complications of freezing testicular tissue<\/strong><\/p>\n<p class=\"\" data-arx-type=\"paragraph\">The new study comes seven years after an article, published in the December 2012 issue of <a href=\"https:\/\/academic.oup.com\/jcem\/article\/97\/12\/4341\/2536357\"><em>The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology &amp; Metabolism<\/em><\/a>, went into detail about several options for cultivating viable sperm cells from immature testicular tissue in primates.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\" data-arx-type=\"paragraph\">At that time, the approach with the greatest potential appeared to be using grafts of immature testicular tissue; however, the study authors added, \u201cgerm cell maturation&nbsp;<em>in vitro<\/em>&nbsp;provides the best strategies to overcome problems of cancer contamination in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cancer.gov\/publications\/dictionaries\/cancer-terms\/def\/testicular-tissue-cryopreservation\">cryopreserved testicular tissue<\/a>\u201d.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\" data-arx-type=\"paragraph\">The study went on to discuss potential problems with freezing testicular tissue in prepubescent males, such as the right timing for a <a href=\"https:\/\/myhealth.alberta.ca\/Health\/pages\/conditions.aspx?hwid=hw234829\">testicular biopsy<\/a>, cryopreservation protocols, strategies for monitoring cancer cell contamination, and the ethical &#8212; and legal &#8212; dilemmas of providing testicular cryopreservation as a clinical procedure.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\" data-arx-type=\"paragraph\"><strong>A better way?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p class=\"\" data-arx-type=\"paragraph\">Given the uncertainties and concerns raised in the previous study, <em>the Science<\/em>-published research by geneticist and postdoctoral associate Adetunji Fayomi from the University of Pittsburgh, and colleagues, indicates a possible way around some of the problems.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\" data-arx-type=\"paragraph\">Fayomi and his team extracted testicular tissue from a prepubescent monkey, froze it, then revived it and grafted it into scrotal or back tissue of an adult monkey that had been castrated. According to a summary of the research published by <a href=\"https:\/\/cosmosmagazine.com\/biology\/monkey-semen-monkey-do\"><em>Cosmos Magazine<\/em><\/a>, the grafts wound up growing successfully and produced viable sperm, some of which was used to fertilize an egg. This procedure resulted in the birth of a female monkey.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\" data-arx-type=\"paragraph\">It is important to note that the researchers encountered issues that, like the previous cited study, uncovered uncertainties: They made ten other similar attempts at the same procedure. These involved five other females, and all of the attempts failed.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\" data-arx-type=\"paragraph\">However, in an accompanying editorial published in the same issue of <em>Science<\/em>, Nina Neuhaus and Stefan Schlatt of the Centre of Reproductive Medicine and Andrology in Germany minimized the significant failure rate in the experiment, noting the included procedures are comprehended better in humans than in other kinds of primates.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\" data-arx-type=\"paragraph\">The authors prognosticated that, in the future, research \u201cwill be more efficient with human material\u201d and, as a result, they suggested that \u201cclinical trials testing this strategy on patient material should now be performed\u201d.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\" data-arx-type=\"paragraph\">What\u2019s more, Kyle Orwig, senior author of the <em>Science<\/em> study and a professor of obstetrics, gynecology and reproductive sciences at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, was quoted by <a href=\"https:\/\/www.scientificamerican.com\/article\/first-baby-monkey-born-using-sperm-from-frozen-testicles\/\"><em>Scientific American<\/em><\/a> as saying that the team initially grafted tissue that had no sperm, but that when they collected the grafts, they were \u201cproducing millions and millions of sperm\u201d. Orwig concluded that he and the team were \u201cconfident\u201d that, were similar circumstances to occur when using human tissue, there would be \u201cmore than enough sperm to fertilize an egg and establish a pregnancy\u201d.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\" data-arx-type=\"paragraph\"><strong>Viability of future treatments<\/strong><\/p>\n<p class=\"\" data-arx-type=\"paragraph\">Orwig noted that even if using a similar treatment as was implemented in the study were to someday allow male childhood cancer survivors to father children, they still would likely need to use some form of assisted reproductive technology \u2013 either in vitro fertilization or <a href=\"https:\/\/www.medicalnewstoday.com\/articles\/217986.php\">artificial insemination<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\" data-arx-type=\"paragraph\">The reason for this, he explains, is that challenges still remain when it comes to making the correct connections between the grafted tissue and the remainder of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.merckmanuals.com\/home\/men-s-health-issues\/biology-of-the-male-reproductive-system\/structure-of-the-male-reproductive-system\">male reproductive system<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\" data-arx-type=\"paragraph\">\u201cWhen we graft tissue,\u201d Orwig says, \u201cthere\u2019s no way for sperm to come out into the ejaculate.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"\" data-arx-type=\"paragraph\">This means that the tissue needs to be extracted from the body and be treated in a lab in order to set free any sperm. It\u2019s also possible, he added, that human males might wish to re-implant tissue grafts when they are teenagers instead of waiting for the time to have a family.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\" data-arx-type=\"paragraph\">\u201cThat way, he\u2019ll know even when he\u2019s a teenager that he has <a href=\"https:\/\/www.givelegacy.com\/order\/\">sperm waiting for him<\/a>, and he\u2019ll be able to have a biological child in the future\u201d.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A new study published in the March 2019 journal Science indicates that removing and freezing testicular tissue containing sperm cells could preserve a man\u2019s fertility \u2013 though, the study cautions, \u201cthere are currently no protocols available to derive sperm from the banked tissue\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":508,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","_seopress_titles_title":"%%post_title%% %%sep%% %%sitetitle%%","_seopress_titles_desc":"%%post_excerpt%%","_seopress_robots_index":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[6,8,42,83,10,18],"tags":[165,204,13,14,38,205],"class_list":["post-403","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-age-male-fertility","category-science","category-fertility-healthcare-science","category-improving-sperm-health-fertility-treatments","category-freezing-sperm","category-improving-sperm-health","tag-aging","tag-fertility-technology","tag-male-factor-infertility","tag-paternal-age","tag-sperm-freezing","tag-stem-cells"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.givelegacy.com\/vnext\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/403"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.givelegacy.com\/vnext\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.givelegacy.com\/vnext\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.givelegacy.com\/vnext\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.givelegacy.com\/vnext\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=403"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.givelegacy.com\/vnext\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/403\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17661,"href":"https:\/\/www.givelegacy.com\/vnext\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/403\/revisions\/17661"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.givelegacy.com\/vnext\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/508"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.givelegacy.com\/vnext\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=403"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.givelegacy.com\/vnext\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=403"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.givelegacy.com\/vnext\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=403"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}