Proteomic approach in the identification of fertility pattern in seminal plasma of fertile men

OBJECTIVE: To identify a panel of common seminal proteins in human seminal plasma by fertile men that might be involved in successful reproduction. DESIGN: Experimental study. SETTING: University hospital. PATIENT(S): Five fertile men who conceived within 3 months before the start of the study. INTERVENTION(S): None. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE(S): Proteomic analysis performed by an Ultimate 3000 Nano/Micro-HPLC apparatus equipped with an FLM-3000-Flow manager module and coupled with an LTQ Orbitrap XL hybrid mass spectrometer; gene ontology analysis. RESULT(S): From 919 to 1,487 unique proteins were identified per individual subject sample. Among these proteins, 83 proteins were present in all samples, including some proteins that might be involved in male fertility, such as semenogelin I, semenogelin II, olfactory receptor 5R1, lactoferrin, hCAP18, spindling, and clusterin. The gene ontology annotation analysis provided further information in describing common pattern in male fertility. CONCLUSION(S): The identification of common seminal plasma proteome in fertile men could provide better insight into the physiology of male fertility and might identify novel markers of male infertility.