noun
definition
A motile, ciliated male gamete produced in the antheridium of an alga, fern or gymnosperm.
Examples of spermatozoid in a Sentence
Even in the multinucleate oosphere of Albugo bliti the nuclei fuse in pairs; and in the oospheres of Sp/zaero plea, which may contain more than one nucleus, the egg nucleus is formed by the fusion of one only of these with the spermatozoid nucleus (Klebahn).
In Monoblepliaris, one of the lower Fungi, in some Algae, in the Vascular Cryptograms, in Cycads (Zamia and Cycas), and in Ginkgo, an isolated genus of Gymnosperms, the male cell is a motile spermatozoid with two or more cilia.
In the Algae, such as Fucus, Volvox, Oedogonium, Bulbochaete, and in the Fungus Monoblepharis, the spermatozoid is a small oval or elongate cell containing nucleus, cytoplasm and sometimes plastids.
In the spermatozoids of Chara, Vascular Cryptogams, and in those of Cycas, Zamia and Ginkgo, the cilia arise from a centrosome-like body which is found on one side of the nucleus of the spermatozoid mother-cell.
The strongest direct evidence seems to be that the nuclear substances are the only parts of the cells which are always equivalent in quantity, and that in the higher plants and animals the male organ or spermatozoid is composed almost entirely of the nucleus, and that the male nucleus is carried into the female cell without a particle of cytoplasm.i Since, however, the nucleus of the female cell is always accompanied by a larger or smaller quantity of cytoplasm, and that in a large majority of the power plants and animals the male cell also contains cytoplasm, it cannot yet be definitely stated that the cytoplasm does not play some part in the process.
In such a case the zoogamete is male, is called an antherozoid or spermatozoid, and arises in an antheridium; the larger gamete is an oosphere and arises in an oogonium.
This thread gives rise to a spiral ciliated band lying in a depression on the body of each spermatozoid; the large spermatozoids eventually escape from the pollen-tube, and are able to perform ciliary movements in the watery liquid which occurs between the thin papery remnant of nucellar tissue and the archegonial necks.
After the body of a spermatozoid has coalesced with the egg-nucleus the latter divides repeatedly and forms a mass of tissue which grows more vigorously in the lower part of the fertilized ovum, and extends upwards towards the apex of the ovum as a peripheral layer of parenchyma surrounding a central space.