NUS Medicine and CHA University to harness artificial intelligence to tackle male infertility, uncovering new approaches to reverse fertility decline

Researchers from the Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine at the National University of Singapore (NUS Medicine) and CHA University in Korea have announced two major advances to extend reproductive longevity at the inaugural NUS-CHA Reproductive Medicine Symposium.

Asia is facing rapid demographic transitions with declining fertility rates across the region. Male infertility rates in East and South Asia are among the world's highest, contributing to over half of the global burden. With more couples deciding to have children later in life, ageing-related reproductive health challenges are increasingly becoming a concern despite advances in assisted reproductive technologies, while diagnostic and therapeutic gaps persist for both sexes.

Leveraging AI and big data for male infertility diagnostics

To tackle male infertility, a significant burden affecting nearly half of the millions of couples struggling to conceive in Asia and globally, Adjunct Assistant Professor Huang Zhongwei from the NUS Bia-Echo Asia Centre for Reproductive Longevity and Equality (ACRLE), based at NUS Medicine, and Associate Professor Lee Jae Ho from CHA University aim to combine artificial intelligence (AI) with comprehensive clinical datasets to create novel diagnostic and decision-support tools for male infertility.

“Male infertility remains one of the most under-diagnosed and under-treated aspects of reproductive medicine,” said Adj Asst Prof Huang, Deputy Director of ACRLE and Consultant at the National University Hospital’s Department of Obstetrics & Gynaecology. “By applying artificial intelligence to extensive clinical data, we can potentially identify hidden patterns and provide clinicians with actionable insights to improve male infertility diagnostics and treatment.”

New research on reversing age-related fertility decline

In parallel, researchers from NUS Medicine and CHA University, led by Adj Asst Prof Huang and Assoc Prof Lee respectively, have identified a way to reverse age-related embryo decline in preclinical models. Ageing has long been one of the biggest barriers to fertility and age‐related decline in egg and embryo quality is a major hurdle in fertility, increasingly so as women decide to have children later in life. 

Published in Biomedicine & Pharmacotherapy, the team demonstrated that using a novel compound called MIT-001 to target and block a major culprit behind age-related reproductive decline — ferroptosis— a form of cell death driven by iron and oxidative stress, embryo growth and blastocyst formation in older preclinical models showed significant improvements. Their findings show that by protecting ageing embryos from self-destructing at the cellular level, MIT-001 or similar mitochondria-targeted therapies could open the door to precision therapies for age-related infertility such as precision cellular rejuvenation, moving beyond current hormone-based interventions.

“Beyond fertility, the study may also open doors to tackle broader ageing issues because ferroptosis and mitochondrial dysfunction are also key drivers of ageing and degenerative diseases. Protecting a cell’s energy system may hold the key to extending healthy ageing itself,” said Adj Asst Prof Huang.

Themed "Advances in Reproductive Medicine in Asia-Pacific," the inaugural NUS-CHA Reproductive Medicine Symposium was a landmark gathering of global thought leaders, showcasing the latest assisted reproductive treatments, IVF discoveries and new possibilities for longevity. Panels and presentations addressed breakthrough topics such as microfluidic and AI-driven platforms in assisted reproduction, cellular aging in ovarian biology, 3D embryo imaging, artificial endometrium models, clinical automation in IVF laboratories, and innovative sperm selection technologies.