Mallea L, Mas J, Padron R S, Diaz J W
Instituto Nacional de Endocrinologia, La Habana/Cuba.
Andrologia. 1988 Jan-Feb;20(1):15-20. doi: 10.1111/j.1439-0272.1988.tb02353.x.
The levels of transferrin in seminal plasma of a large sample of infertile men (n = 287) were measured by radioimmunoassay. A group of recently pregnancy-proven fertile men (n = 20) was used as control and a small group (n = 6) of vasectomized men was studied to determine the origin of seminal transferrin. Infertile men had lower transferrin values than fertile men, although the difference was not significant in the case of normozoospermic infertile men (0,05 less than p less than 0,1); in the case of oligozoospermic infertile men the difference was highly significant (p less than 0,001). The values of transferrin in severely oligozoospermic, azoospermic and vasectomized subjects suggested that 60% of seminal transferrin could be of testicular origin. In infertile patients transferrin fall along with sperm count; there is a strong correlation between transferrin and sperm density. FSH levels were measured in a group of severely oligozoospermic and azoospermic patients (n = 41); although the patients with elevated FSH had lower transferrin levels than the patients with FSH within the normal range, the difference was not significant. The results of this study show that transferrin could be a useful marker of seminiferous tubular function but more work is needed to assess its relevance for clinical practice.
采用放射免疫分析法对大量不育男性样本（n = 287）的精浆中转铁蛋白水平进行了测定。选取一组近期已证实可生育的男性（n = 20）作为对照，并对一小群输精管结扎男性（n = 6）进行了研究，以确定精浆转铁蛋白的来源。不育男性的转铁蛋白值低于可育男性，不过对于精子正常的不育男性而言，差异并不显著（0.05 < p < 0.1）；对于少精子症不育男性，差异则极为显著（p < 0.001）。严重少精子症、无精子症及输精管结扎受试者的转铁蛋白值表明，60%的精浆转铁蛋白可能来源于睾丸。在不育患者中，转铁蛋白水平随精子计数下降；转铁蛋白与精子密度之间存在很强的相关性。对一组严重少精子症和无精子症患者（n = 41）测定了促卵泡激素（FSH）水平；尽管FSH升高的患者转铁蛋白水平低于FSH在正常范围内的患者，但差异并不显著。本研究结果表明，转铁蛋白可能是生精小管功能的一个有用标志物，但还需要更多研究来评估其在临床实践中的相关性。
