sperm+article+-+rachel

Sperm Article (1) What is a germ cell? (male germ cell and female germ cell) haploid cells that combine for sexual reproduction (2) Compare the size of a sperm to an egg. Insert a picture here comparing the sizes. While eggs are among the largest cells within the body, sperm are some of the smallest. The width alone of the egg is actually 30 times the size of sperm cell.

(3) Compare the number of eggs produced by human females to the number sperm produced by human males. Females are born with about one million eggs (that’s it, they do not produce anymore after birth) of which approximately 500 will run the possibility of fertilization. Whereas when the male testes hits puberty it produces about four million sperm every hour (that’s around 12 trillion sperm per lifetime). (4) Describe semen. What is the purpose of semen? Normally seminal fluid is a mixture of sugar, citric acid, plus other nutrients “designed to pamper and power” sperm to achieve the best probability of survival. Only 1% of semen is sperm yet that number is around 150 million sperm. (5) What can be wrong with sperm? What percentage of sperm are usually normal? “the majority of sperm are abnormally shaped.” Around 15% of sperm are actually perfectly normal and will be able to penetrate an egg. (6) Where do sperm develop? Why could a fever disrupt sperm production for months? Sperm develop in the testicles. The tesistcles are about 2 degrees lower than body temperature, a fever could disrupt the sperm production because it would raise the body temperature causing the sperm to be less fertile. (7) Describe in detail the three parts of a sperm cell. Head – mostly made up of a supercondensed tangle of 23 chromosomes, the tip is the acrosome Midpiece – made up of mitchondria Tail – 11 filaments works as a propeller (8) How do the sperm react to being in the female reproductive tract? How do they know where to go? Upon reaching the female reproductive tract the sperm awakens due to chemical signals from the vaginal and cervical mucus. The sperm can sense ovulating eggs (change in calcium ions) within the fallopian tubes. (9) How is the egg only fertilized by one sperm? As soon as a sperm is able to penetrate the egg an ionic jolt occurs causing the egg’s outer coat to create a barrier prohibiting any other sperm cells from entering.