Binding of Spermatozoa to Positively Charged Beads as an Inexpensive Method to Isolate Sperm Heads and Tails

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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 sulfate and trypsin. The bound spermatozoa could be slowly released from the beads in a concentrated solution of salts, the best among those 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 65-80% with 2-10% of tails contaminating; the yield of the tail was 30-40% with no cross contamination.