Mediators of Inflammation

Research Article

Fatty Acid Profile and Metabolism Are Related to Human Sperm Parameters and Are Relevant in Idiopathic Infertility and Varicocele

Table 2

Medians and interquartile ranges of evaluated seminal parameters normalized to sperm fatty acid (FA) content or sperm count.


Normalized seminal parameters	Fertility () Group 1	Idiopathic infertility () Group 2	Infertile Varicocele () Group 3	Kruskal-Wallis value	Pairwise comparisons
Normalized seminal parameters	Fertility () Group 1	Idiopathic infertility () Group 2	Infertile Varicocele () Group 3	Kruskal-Wallis value	Group 1 vs. group 2	Group 1 vs. group 3	Group 2 vs. group 3

EPA/ARA ratio	0.05 (0.15)	0.30 (0.68)	0.10 (0.30)	0.11
SFA/MUFA ratio	5.55 (6.95)	3.25 (3.15)	4.80 (3.08)	0.39
n-6/n-3 PUFA ratio	0.45 (0.23)	0.85 (0.48)	0.75 (0.73)
F₂-IsoP/ARA ratio	2.97 (4.36)	10.84 (21.38)	27.07 (21.41)
F₂-IsoP/sperm/ml ratio	0.06 (0.10)	1.01 (3.31)	1.05 (2.47)
N/ARA ratio	7.82 (6.97)	13.90 (8.10)	12.16 (14.71)
A/ARA ratio	1.66 (1.50)	3.18 (7.01)	2.53 (2.56)	0.13
N/n-6 PUFA ratio	1.87 (2.44)	3.94 (1.60)	2.27 (1.45)		ns	ns	ns
A/n-6 PUFA ratio	0.40 (0.39)	0.77 (0.69)	0.37 (0.35)
I/n-6 PUFA ratio	3.85 (2.90)	5.17 (3.44)	4.07 (2.51)	0.82
N/n-3 PUFA ratio	0.86 (0.88)	2.83 (1.64)	1.58 (2.01)
A/n-3 PUFA ratio	0.20 (0.17)	0.55 (0.29)	0.32 (0.23)
I/n-3 PUFA ratio	1.71 (0.99)	3.06 (4.40)	3.72 (0.80)

EPA: eicosapentaenoic; ARA: arachidonic acid; SFAs: saturated fatty acids; MUFAs: monounsaturated fatty acids; PUFAs: polyunsaturated fatty acids; F₂-IsoPs: F₂-isoprostanes; N: sperm necrosis; A: sperm apoptosis; I: sperm immaturity. Statistics are reported (, , and ).