Effect of osmolality and phosphate, ‘Tris’, ‘TES’, ‘MES’, and ‘Hepes‘ hydrogen ion buffers on the motility of bull spermatozoa stored at 37 or 5°C

Abstract

Bull spermatozoa survived incubation, in unstoppered tubes at 5 and 37°C, better in solutions of 250 m-05molesJkg than in solutions of higher or lower osmolalities regardless of the concentrations of sodium chloride or citrate in the solutions relative to the concentrations of phosphate, Tris, TES, MES, or HEPES. When buffer solutions contributed 120 m-osmolesJkg to a total diluent strength of 250 mosmolesJkg, the ranking from best to worst on the basis of survival of spermatozoa was: MES, HEPES, TES, Tris, and phosphate. Comparisons when 50 mM concentrations of the buffers were used showed the same ranking except that HEPES was as good as.MES. © 1972 CSIRO.