Something new came up in the human fertility department, this time concerning the men. In a recent study done by scientists from Queen’s University in Belfast they found out the high levels of broken or damaged DNA in the sperm cells of men with diabetes. This finding is the very first of its kind.

The scientists studied volunteers coming from a center of endocrinology – 27 are those who have Type 1 diabetes and the control group is 29 without diabetes. All of them in their 30s. When their sperms were examined everything was found normal like in the sperm count, output and structure, though the diabetic men had a smaller amount of semen. But when they checked the DNA that’s when they saw the difference. The DNA in the sperm of the diabetic men appeared fragmented or damaged compared to those from the healthy men. The fragmentation showed 52% in the diabetic compared to the 32% in non-diabetic men.

This study is very significant because previous studies have pointed out that flawed sperm cells can lead to infertility in males, pregnancy failure and if the couple is able to conceive there is some chance that miscarriage might occur.