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 osmolali-ties 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 m-osmolesJkg, the ranking from best to worst on the basis of survival of spermatozoa was: MES, HEPES, TES, Tris, and phosphate. Comparisons when 50 mM con-centrations of the buffers were used showed the same ranking except that HEPES was as good as.MES.