Human epididymal tissue was recovered from 11 patients undergoing orchidectomy without anti-androgen treatment. Everted epithelial fragments from the caput and corpus epididymis of six patients were successfully cultured in a modified RPMI 1640 medium supplemented with HEPES and androgens for up to 110 days (mean 56 +/- 28) in 5% CO(2) in air at 37 degrees C. Epithelial cells from human oviduct...

More than 3000 plants of notable phyto-therapeutic value grow in South Africa; these include Cissampelos capensis, commonly known in Afrikaans as dawidjie or dawidjiewortel. C. capensis is the most significant and popular medicinal plant used by the Khoisan as well as other rural groups in the Western region of South Africa. Its rhizomes are traditionally used to treat male fertility problems. ...

sperms are highly specialized cells for delivering dna from male to the ovum. incredibly, wide degree of diversity in sperm morphology in their basic structures i.e. head, middle piece and tail is found across species. differences in terms of overall size of the sperm, shape and number of sperm produced are also incredible. one of the key for this variations or diversity in sperm may be associa...

The primary aim of this study was to establish a flow cytometric technique for determining the capacitation status of stallion spermatozoa. To this end, a flow cytometric technique that demonstrates changes in plasma membrane fluidity; namely, merocyanine 540 staining, was compared with the more conventional Ca(2+)-dependent fluorescence microscopic technique, chlortetracycline (CTC) staining, ...

Whole semen can be stored successfully under both aerobic and anaerobic conditions, owing to the presence of glycolysable carbohydrate in the seminal plasma. However, if mammalian spermatozoa are separated from the seminal plasma by centrifuging and washing, they can maintain their motility only in the presence of oxygen. From this it has been inferred that when spermatozoa are deprived of fruc...

In all species studied, fertilization induces intracellular Ca ([Ca]i) oscillations required for oocyte activation and embryonic development. This species-specific pattern has not been studied in the equine, partly due to the difficulties linked to in vitro fertilization in this species. Therefore, the objective of this study was to use intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) to investigate fer...