Whats a sperm cryobank?
first a few definitions… The term “Cryo” is a prefix derived from the Greek word “Kryos” which means cold or frost. Cryogenics is that area of science that deals with the study of matter at very low temperatures. A “cryobank” is a facility in which frozen tissue, in this case sperm, is stored. …and a little bit of history The interest in storage and preservation of sperm dates back to the 1776 when Lazaro Spallanzani, an Italian priest and physiologist, first reported that sperm became “motionless” when cooled by snow. However, it wasn’t until 1866 that a scientist named Montegazza suggested that “a man dying on the battlefield may beget a legal heir with his semen frozen and stored at home”. Unfortunately, that dream took more than 100 years to be realized. In the late 1930’s and early 1940’s scientists found that sperm could survive freezing lower than -3210 F (-1600 C). The problem was how to insure survival and function for prolonged periods of time.
