Emma-Sperm+Article

Sperm Article (1) What is a germ cell? (male germ cell and female germ cell) (2) Compare the size of a sperm to an egg. Insert a picture here comparing the sizes. Sperm are the smallest cells in the body, while the egg (30 times the width of a sperm) can be seen with the naked eye. (3) Compare the number of eggs produced by human females to the number sperm produced by human males. - Females are born carrying the 1 million eggs they will have for their lifetime. However, only 500 of these 1 million will ever have a chance to fertilize. Men on the other hand, produce 4 million new sperms cell every hour per testicle. Therefore having a lifetime total of 12 trillion or more. (4) Describe semen. What is the purpose of semen? Semen is nonspermic and generally consists of a viscous mix of sugars, citric acid and other ingredients designed to pamper and power the sperm cells for their journey into the female body. (5) What can be wrong with sperm? What percentage of sperm are usually normal? Normally only about 15% of sperm are perfectly normal and can penetrate the egg. This is because, many sperm are abnormally shaped. For example they could have may have pinheads, others have two heads, some lack tails, a third don’t move at all. (6) Where do sperm develop? Why could a fever disrupt sperm production for months? -Sperm develop in the testes which hang outside the body and therefore can be kept cool by breezes. Sperm is created in temperatures 2 degrees below the body which is exactly why high temperatures in baths or from a fever can halt the production. (7) Describe in detail the three parts of a sperm cell. The head of the sperm cell is really 23 tangled chromosomes. At the very tip of the sperm is the acrosome, a specialized sack of enzymes which helps the sperm to get past all the tissue and cells that surround the egg. Below the head is the mid piece which is packed with mitochondria who give the sperm its motility.Below the midpiece is the tail whose main job is to trash and propel the sperm at speed's equal to a humans stride at 4 mph. (8) How do the sperm react to being in the female reproductive tract? How do they know where to go? Chemical signals from the vaginal and cervical mucus really bring he sperm to life and they set out on a straight path. Then if If an egg has burst from its ovarian follicle and been plucked by a fallopian tube the sperm are able to sense the shift in calcium ions and the sperm then go crazy doing figure eights and trying to break barriers. (9) How is the egg only fertilized by one sperm? -Polyspermy is this process and specifically it is the entrance of one or more sperm into an egg and it is prevented because as soon as a sperm touches the egg the egg's plasma membrane depolarizes, which prevents the binding of any other sperm.