Incidence of chromosome 21 disomy in human spermatozoa as determined by fluorescent in-situ hybridization

Abstract

We have evaluated the incidence of chromosome 21 disomy in decondensed sperm heads from nine normal men using a locus-specific DNA probe for chromosome 21, and a centromeric probe for chromosome 6 as a control. The results show that the incidence of chromosome 21 disomy (0.38%) is significantly higher than disomy for chromosome 6(0.14%). No differences were found among the individuals analysed.