Just last week we reported that an inventor came up with a switch that allowed men to switch on or off their sperm, which was basically designed as a new method of contraception. However if you’re a man looking to procreate and the last thing you want to do is turn your sperm “off”, researchers at IFW Dresden in Germany might have a solution for you.
The researchers have created what is being referred to as spermbots. Basically this is designed to help men whose sperm are weak (also known as “slow swimmers”) to reach the egg. What they have done is introduce metal-coated polymer helices that will be able to wrap itself around the tail of the sperm, and with the help of magnets, will give the sperm the push it needs to reach the egg.
This is actually not a new invention. The researchers came up with the idea a couple of years ago, except that back then they put the sperm itself inside microscopic tubes that would be guided by magnetic fields to reach the egg. According to the researchers with regards to the new design, “We have chosen magnetic helices as micromotors because of their relatively simple mechanism of motion that is widely understood and easy to control in 3D by a common setup of axial pairs of Helmholtz coils.”
Unfortunately if you are a man who has weak swimmers, you won’t be able to get your hands on this technology anytime soon. While the researchers are optimistic, they say that there is still a lot of work left to be done before they even ready for clinical trials, but it’s still something to look forward to in the next few years.