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An international team of paleontologists discovered a piece of amber analyzed in Burma some fossilized sperm from a tiny crustacean that would have 100 million years and they are the oldest found so far.
As explained by the team of researchers led by Dr. Wang, of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, in an article published on Wednesday in the prestigious scientific journal Journal of Royal Society, so far, the oldest fossilized sperm found by scientists had 17 millions of years.
The animal to which these sperm belong is an ostracod called by scientists “Myanmarcypris hui”, a species that measures less than a millimeter and that has existed for 500 million years and it is present today in oceans, lakes and rivers.
During the Cretaceous period, which began 145 million years ago and ended 66 years ago, the ostracods studied probably lived off the coasts of present-day Burma, where they were trapped in a clump of tree resin.
The sperm found were found inside a female specimen, indicating that it had to be fertilized before being trapped in the amber.
The second peculiarity of the finding is that these sperm are considered “giants” because they could measure four times as long as the parent male.
“This would be equivalent to (a sperm) of 7.30 meters in a man of 1.70 meters, that is to say, it takes a lot of energy to produce them!” Renate Matzke-Karasz, from the Ludwig-Maximilians University explained to AFP from Munich, who is the co-author of the study.
It is therefore a kind of exception, since all males, including man, produce tens of millions of tiny sperm. But this ostracod favors the quality of its sperm over quantity.
According to the researcher, the female would also play a very important role in the process since her reproductive organs must adapt to receive this giant sperm.
This discovery shows that “reproduction with giant sperm is not a freak of extinction evolution but an important long-term advantage to the survival of the species,” Matzke-Karasz said.
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