Authors: Sevtap Kilic Nese Lortlar Yesim Bardakci Erkan Ozdemir Beril Yuksel Ufuk Ozturk Gurer Budak Muammer Dogan
Publish Date: 2008/12/24
Volume: 26, Issue: 1, Pages: 57-
Abstract
Caspase3 expression was significantly increased in germ cells in maturation arrest specimens in smoker azoospermic patients No statistically significant difference was present between smokers and nonsmokers for caspase3 expression in Sertoli cell However the VEGF immunopositive Leydig cells were statistically higher in smokers There were no differences between groups in terms of germ cell immunopositivityOur results support the hypothesis that increased apoptosis contributes significantly to impaired spermatogenesis We conjecture that germ cell apoptosis may be augmented by hypoxic microenvironments and environmental toxicants in smoking azoospermic men
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