Sperm reservoir

Sialoglycoconjugates also seem to be involved in calcium binding of bone tissues.415 Neu as a component of an acidic glycoprotein is directly involved in the formation of a sperm reservoir in the vagina of the pig by salt-like coagulation with a basic protein of the boar ejaeu-... 

Suarez, S. (1998). The oviductal sperm reservoir in mammals Mechanisms of formation. Biol. Reprod. 58 1105-1107. 

Once the spermatozoa enter the oviductal isthmus, things become more complicated. The mammalian oviductal isthmus was convincingly demonstrated to serve as a sperm reservoir or storage site after ejaculation (Figure 4) [11, 67, 71, 117, 159, 160]. (Defective, nonmotile spermatozoa and cells vwth disrupted membranes are apparently not stored they appear to be passively and rapidly transported away towards the peritoneal cavity—see [116] for a review.) Spermatozoa that are not yet capacitated, that is, immature spermatozoa that have not yet acquired fertilizing potential [80, 186], attach to the oviductal epithelium and are released only when they become capacitated, i.e., only when they acquire a state of readiness to fertilize the egg. 

In most mammals, spermatozoa become motile while in the proximal cauda epididymis. The epididymis is also a reservoir for sperm. In addition, maturation of the spermatic plasma membrane in the epididymis involves physical and chemical alterations in the membrane lipids. Seminal and prostatic fluids are added to the semen during its passage through the male reproductive tract. 

Another method for the analysis of sexual assault evidence exploits the differential physical and chemical properties of sperm and epithelial cells to result in a cell separation, from which DNA can be extracted from each population independently. In this simple method, the epithelial cells settle to the bottom of the microchip inlet reservoir more rapidly than the sperm cells (as a result of their size and density). By subsequently invoking flow in the microchannel, sperm cells are swept from the inlet to the outlet reservoir, where they can be either collected for subsequent analysis or packed up against a silica bead/sol-gel bed for DNA extraction (Figure 37.1a). Efficient separation of a mixture of sperm and epithelial cells has been demonstrated via short tandem repeat... 

An interesting approach reported for obtaining purified male and female fractions on microdevices involves acoustic differential extraction (ADE) and exploits microacoustic transducer developments (see Chapter 44 by Laurell for details). This method involves the elution of biological material from the vaginal swab under mild lysis conditions, resulting in a mixture of sperm cells and epithelial cell lysate. The sample is then infused in the microdevice, and sperm cells trapped in a monolayer above an ultrasonic transducer while free DNA (from the lysed epithelial cells) flows through the system unretained. Flow of the epithelial cell lysate is directed to the outlet reservoir... 

The urethra is a tubular structure through which urine is expelled after accumulating in the physiological reservoir called the bladder. In men, this canal is also used by the seminal ducts and carries the sperm from the veru montanum all the way to the external urethral orifice. 

Waxes are present in fish oils, especially in sperm whale blubber and whale head oil, which contain a reservoir of spermaceti wax. 

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