The movement of human spermatozoa in cervical mucus.
Movement characteristics of freely swimming spermatozoa were studied with high-speed cinemicrography. At 21 degrees C, flagellar beat frequency was higher in midcycle human cervical mucus than in native semen or Tyrode's solution; the beat shape differed, possessing diminished amplitude and wavelength. Although the spermatozoa swam straighter in the mucus, the progressive swimming speeds did not differ in the three media. Swimming speed and beat frequency were linearly related in semen and in Tyrode, but in mucus the linearity was less certain. In midcycle cervical mucus at 37 degrees C, beat frequencies and swimming speeds were greater than at 21 degrees C, but the trajectories were equally straight, and the distances swum per beat (kinetic efficiencies) did not differ.
Duke Scholars
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Related Subject Headings
- Temperature
- Sperm Transport
- Semen
- Obstetrics & Reproductive Medicine
- Male
- Humans
- Follicular Phase
- Female
- Cervix Mucus
- 3215 Reproductive medicine
Citation
Published In
DOI
ISSN
Publication Date
Volume
Issue
Start / End Page
Related Subject Headings
- Temperature
- Sperm Transport
- Semen
- Obstetrics & Reproductive Medicine
- Male
- Humans
- Follicular Phase
- Female
- Cervix Mucus
- 3215 Reproductive medicine