01.08.2025
Thanks to this software, the three basic sperm parameters—density, morphology, and motility—can be determined automatically and more quickly.
Students from Istanbul Medipol University’s International Faculty of Medicine won first place in the health category at TEKNOFEST Adana with their domestically produced artificial intelligence-based sperm analysis software, which will be used to diagnose male infertility.
According to a statement from the university, the final evaluation results of the “2242 University Student Research Project Competition,” held as part of TEKNOFEST 2024, have been announced. The software, developed by fifth-year students Hacı Burhanettin Yıldırım, Mustafa Salih Gücez, and Mehmet Berke İşler at Istanbul Medipol University’s International Faculty of Medicine, won first place in the “Health Category.”
The students, who participated in the competition under the name “Long Live the Sperm,” were mentored by Assoc. Prof. Dr. Seda Karabulut and Prof. Dr. Reda AlHajj, faculty member of the Computer Engineering Department of the Faculty of Engineering and Natural Sciences, led the project.
The multidisciplinary study, developed by students pursuing a double major in the Computer Engineering Department, is called “Computer-Aided Sperm Analysis.” Thanks to the software, the three basic sperm parameters—density, morphology, and motility—can be determined both automatically and more quickly.
– “We have applied for a patent for our work.”
Mehmet Berke İşler, one of the students, stated that their greatest motivation for the project was that no similar study had been conducted in this field in Türkiye before. He said, “Currently, there is no ‘Computer-Aided Sperm Analysis’ system, which we call a safe, in Türkiye, and this software is procured from abroad when needed. We aim to further develop this software and add value to our country.”
Mustafa Gücez, who is also involved in the project, explained that their goal is to develop a diagnostic method that can detect male infertility in in vitro fertilization centers and all areas where sperm analysis is used.
Gücez emphasized the need to obtain more data from laboratories by optimizing their models, saying, “We want to train our model using the data we’ve collected. We’ve filed a patent application for our work. Once the system is fully optimized and accuracy rates increase, we want to turn the patent into a product and introduce it to healthcare institutions.”
Hacı Burhanettin Yıldırım also emphasized the importance of multidisciplinary approaches in providing innovative solutions, noting that they had the opportunity to work and observe in the embryology laboratory for extended periods.
Yıldırım explained that sperm analysis is a process performed in laboratories by examining images under a microscope, and shared the following information:
“This process has results that can vary depending on the individual. Our innovative work allows for both objective evaluation and faster processing through artificial intelligence. Thanks to our multidisciplinary work, the software we developed fully automates this process. Our software also has high accuracy rates. Because the project is about artificial intelligence, we utilized various models of artificial intelligence. We particularly utilized recently developed software.”