Journal Club: New approaches in sperm evaluation: heterogenity of ejaculates and non-invasive techniques

Sperm is the most diverse cell type known and it is considered that this diversity reflects differences in sperm function. However, how assess these differences between sperm belonging to the same ejaculate and, most importantly, how to select in real-time that spermatozoa with a particular trait remains incompletely described. Many sperm selection techniques developer so far are time consuming and required some procedures, which can be harmful to the cell. In addition, most of them are based on sperm parameters that do not provide relevant information if these spermatozoa are used by means of assisted reproduction techniques (ART). Recently, new technologies are being developed using non-invasive methods to sperm selection in combination with novel sperm markers, which will be useful in the future to detect normal functional sperm for ART.