Abstract
Summary
Sperm cells from rat, rabbit, and man are fibrinolytically active. Studied histochemically, an activator of plasminogen is localized to the sperm cell head, while the tail is inactive. The presence of inhibitory compounds, removable by washing, prevents the direct demonstration of fibrinolytically active sperm cells in frozen sections of testis or epididymis of rat and rabbit, and smears prepared from unwashed material require a prolonged incubation period. Human semen liquefies the fibrin layer after only brief incubation.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.