Other than patient's asthenia, are there other kinds of relationship that may explain iron deficiency anemia and male infertility?
There is a report that suggests that mitochondrial iron is required for proper spermatogenesis in Drosophila, but this has not been verified in a mammalian system (Metzendorf et al BMC Dev Biol. 2010). Even if this holds true in the human, the iron deficiency would (I guess) have to to be so dramatic that the anemic symptoms would explain the lack of energy for fertility. One way to answer your question could possibly be to check spermatic function in IRIDA patients (Finberg et al Nat Genetics 2008).
Thank your Raffaele for your interesting suggestions. The first paper you cite strengthen my hunch.
IRIDA may be, theoretically, a good model to study iron deficiency and fertility, but I don't get the connection in the paper by Finberg, could you explain that to me?
Just gave the reference of the paper who described the genetic etiology of IRIDA to help think about using this disease as a possible model. No link to fertility, as I am sure we'll cite Saettini et al. in the future about this topic! Good luck!
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