Development and implementation of a novel panel consisting 20 markers for the detection of genetic causes of male infertility.

Azoospermia factor (AZF) genes are involved in spermatogenesis. Deletions in the region of these genes have been recognised as a major genetic cause of infertility due to defects in spermatogenesis. Klinefelter syndrome (KS) is the other main cause of male infertility. This study was performed to establish a novel method for the detection of genetic causes of infertility in males and also to investigate the prevalence, extent and position of Y chromosome microdeletions in Iranian infertile men. We developed a newly designed panel of fluorescent multiplex-PCR method to amplify 20 markers (15 sequence-tagged sites (STSs) markers which are placed in the Y chromosome AZF region, 2 short tandem repeats (STRs) and 3 segmental duplications (SDs)). This multifunctional method is for the simultaneous detection of Y chromosome microdeletions and KS. Among 149 studied infertile men, one was detected to suffer from KS and seven (4.7%) were detected with the presence of one or more deleted STS loci. The main cause of infertility for the remaining patients would be nongenetic factors. This strategy is represented as a fast and accurate method to determine the frequencies of different AZF microdeletions which are suitable for use in clinical purposes.