Module
4
Icon module 4
Fertilization

Learning aims

  • Explaining the ovulation process
  • Knowing the necessary steps which lead to spermatozoa being ready
  • Describing how the enabling of the spermatozoa takes place
  • Describing how the spermatozoon penetrates into the oocyte
  • Knowing the process whereby a zygote is formed

What you should already know

  • How the female genital tract is formed (anatomy)
  • Development of the oocyte in the ovary
  • How the male genital tract is formed (anatomy)
  • Spermatogenesis

Delving deeper

  • When the spermatozoon leaves the testicle it is not yet capable of fertilizing an oocyte. What changes must it undergo to make it capable of uniting with the oocyte (capacitation)?
  • How does the oocyte get from the ovary into the fallopian tube?
  • What makes it possible for the spermatozoon to penetrate into the oocyte?
  • How is it made sure that a spermatozoon from another species is unable to deposit its genetic material?
  • When the fertilization is completed, the genes of the two parents have united. How does this union of the two genomes take place?
Key concepts
Notions that are important in the fertilization module.

Introduction

For successful fertilization, a mature spermatozoon (sperm cell) must penetrate into the mature oocyte. At the same time this is also an encounter between one of the smallest human cells with one of the largest: The head of the sperm has a diameter of only 4µm, whereas the egg cell has one of 120µm (0.12 mm!) aufweist

Fig. 1 - Oocyte with corona radiata
media/module4/d0a_EizCorona.jpg

  1. Cumulus oophorus
  2. Oocyte

Fig. 2 - Native spermatozoa
media/module4/d0b_Ejaknativ.jpg

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Spermatozoon tail
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Spermatozoon head
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Seminal plasma

Legend
Fig. 1

An Oocyte following ovulation, surrounded by a cloud of cumulus cells, the corona radiata, which form a cloak around it.
© Dr. A. Senn et al, CHUV Lausanne

 

Fig. 2

Spermatozoa in a native ejaculate. These must still mature in several steps during their way through the female genital tract before they are able to fertilize the oocyte.

One can speak of a successful fertilization when the genetic material of the male spermatozoon has united with that of the female oocyte thereby creating a new, unique individual.

More indo

What Swiss lawmakers say about this topic.

Video
Ejaculate
Fig. 3 - Impregnated oocyte
media/module4/d0c_EizImpVorkerne.jpg

  1. Male nucleus
  2. Female nucleus closer to the polar body
  3. A polar body
  4. Pellucid zone

Fig. 4 - Zygote
media/module4/d0d_Zygote.jpg

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Several polar bodies

Legend
Fig. 3

In this oocyte the the two nuclei are just about to fuse. Since the spermatozoon penetrated into the oocyte, more than 18 - 20 hours have elapsed (the cumulus cells have been shaved away so the oocyte can be better seen)
© Dr. A. Senn et al, CHUV Lausanne

 

Fig. 4

After the nuclei have fused the spindle apparatus with the chromosomes in the anaphase appears (not shown). The zygote, the first cell of the embryo, immediately divides into two cells.
© Dr. A. Senn et al, CHUV Lausanne