A computer system for a human semen quality assessment

An automatic computer system to assist assessment of a human semen quality is described. The hardware of the system consists of PC with frame grabber and CCD camera connected to an optical microscope with bright field optic. The software of the system consists of four modules: (1) acquisition of real time sequences of semen, (2) assessment of mobility o sperm cells, (3) calculation of density, and (4) morphology examination of sperm cells. There are few commercial CASA (Computer Assisted Semen Analysis) systems that measure a quantity of semen. Some of them measure only one factor of semen whereas others recognize sperm cells based on user-defined parameters. The described system calculates all factors required for semen quality assessment and recognizes sperm cells by its shape, structure and size.