Thechanges in calcium concentrationwithin the sperm they controlhow fast these cells beat their tails(flagella) to navigate towards the ovum, its final destination. And these changes in calcium levels occur precisely when the eggs secrete certain substances. Scientists from the Max Planck Institute in Germany, with the participation of the Spanish researcher Luis Álvarez, have just shown thatduring this process the sperm perform very complex calculations, which involve “measuring rates of change over time, that is, how quickly or slowly the concentration of calcium entering the cell changes.” Expressed in mathematical language, it could be said that sperm do not measure absolute values, but rathercalculate the time derivative of the calcium concentration.
The research has focused on analyzing sperm from different marine species using strobe laser light – similar to that used in discos. However, scientists suspect that sperm from other species, including humans, could behave in the same way.
In addition, now that it has been shown that “it does not take a whole brain to do mathematical operations”, it is possible that the extraordinary calculation capacity detected in sperm is applied to other intracellular chemical messengers that control different vital functions in different cells of the body . “This is only the beginning”, advance the authors of the investigation.
