title: Binding of spermatozoa to positively charged beads as an inexpensive method to isolate sperm heads and tails.
abstract: Rat epididymal spermatozoa were capable of rapid binding to various positively charged beads, but not to beads with negative or no charge. The binding appeared to involve the end-piece and perhaps a portion of the tail. The binding was quite resistant to acid, heat, Triton X-100, sodium dodecyl sulphate and trypsin. The bound spermatozoa could be slowly released from the beads in a concentrated solution of salts, the best among these tested was 1 M-ammonium acetate. The bead-binding property of the spermatozoa was employed to develop, a new, simple and inexpensive method to isolate heads and tails without the use of an ultracentrifuge. The yield of the heads from spermatozoa of the cauda epididymis was 65 to 80% with 2 to 10% of tails contaminating while the yield of the tail was 30 to 40% with no cross contamination.
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D002411:Cation Exchange Resins; D002458:Cell Fractionation / Q000379:methods; D008297:Male; D017830:Octoxynol; D011092:Polyethylene Glycols; D051381:Rats; D012967:Sodium Dodecyl Sulfate; D013077:Sperm Head / Q000648:ultrastructure*; D013082:Sperm Tail / Q000648:ultrastructure*; D013094:Spermatozoa / Q000648:ultrastructure*; D014357:Trypsin
chemical_list: D002411:Cation Exchange Resins; D012967:Sodium Dodecyl Sulfate; D011092:Polyethylene Glycols; D017830:Octoxynol; D014357:Trypsin