Does menthol kill spermatozoa?

SAZAR

Does menthol kill spermatozoa or is it neutral... or maybe even helps it somehow?? (I don't know - I don't have a microscope, and Internet says nothing about it specifically so I ask)

Now - someone would say "Well - you know - it depends on concentration!" - so - here - for example: say you have a menthol tablet for sore throat say 160mg in weight, containing 2mg of menthol, 0.1mg of sodium usnat and sorbitol artificial sweetener - would it kill spermatozoa?

Lievo

I would expect the main effect is to increase survival because you would also put sugar. But you'll have to experiment if you want to know.

SAZAR

How come - haven't anyone tested it already? - I mean it is a substance too common not to have been tested on ALL sorts of things.
Doesn't it have bactericidal properties?
...

...Anyone have a microscope?

(I mean - to test it and present the results... not to lend me one :B )

Proton Soup

the only thing that shows up on pubmed

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/arti...7/?tool=pubmed

does this mean it would increase or decrease fertility?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acrosome_reaction

SAZAR

Yea', I've found it too when I was first looking - but does it mean menthol opens a spermatozoon prematurely and thus destroy it or it makes it more ready to fuse with egg cell?

...Gee... how I would like to have a 1000x microscope...

epenguin

It would be risky to rely on it too much.

SAZAR

Back that claim with scientific analysis resulting from methodical testings.

SAZAR

(...I can't really believe that I still didn't get definite answer; why is it so hard to test it - surely someone (if not all) the people who read my thread have a microscope in their possession...)

SAZAR

Does ______ menthol ______ kill ______ spermatozoIDS?!

Perfection

Let's say we get some sperm, and then pour some menthol on it and it kills some. I would not say that's sufficient evidence to use it as an effective means of contraception.

SAZAR

Some? Or all?
What is the actual case?

Proton Soup

are you asking for medical advice? you want to use this as some kind of contraceptive?

that's not a question people here can answer for you.

it's' not even a well-defined question. do you intend to inhale menthol in a cigarette, ingest it, or apply it topically? topically would seem to provide the most hilarious outcome. i doubt the young lady would allow you near her again.

but for the sake of discussion, why don't you just assume the answer is no.

SAZAR

... This is a forum which deals with science - it's obvious that my question is in such spirit - else why would I post it here -- your attitude is confusing; the question was and is perfectly simple -- I mean I don't get it why these subversions take place. -
Here: Imagine a lab and scientists in white lab coats who need to answer this question - they look through a microscope - they see spermatozoa wiggling and moving around - they add menthol-rich solution --- now: What happens? - That simple. That was and is my question.

How come this thread turned into something concerning practical issues? -- I couldn't quickly find that piece of information on the Internet (the simple straight-forward answer to the question "Does menthol kill spermatozoa?"), so I asked a question here - simple as that - I imagined it as a quick question with a quick answer - yet it mutated into some strange happening.

How 'funny' - I asked a quick question then and there expecting a quick and straight-forward answer something like 5 minutes after it, yet I STILL didn't get a definite answer.
I can assume that the answer is 'no' and that the answer is 'yes'... now where did I get?

bobze

Because you question is non-specific and not very scientific. You need to define the parameters you are looking to be answered and it would help if you added what the application you had in mind.

For example with your above scenario, what concentration of a solution? Biology 101: essentially anything is deadly in the right concentration and dose, even water.

How are you defining "killing"? Spermatazoa aren't free living organisms, do you mean does it make them non-motile? unable to achieve their function? In activates their mitochondria? Lyses them? Inactivates their protein machinery? Etc.

What about time? How long is the exposure? Etc.

See, you may have asked a simple question--but it is, without context, an essentially meaningless question.

Proton Soup

you've been pushy and rude. and as bobze points out, you don't ask a very well-defined question.

but let's say you actually bothered to read the paper i linked to earlier:
so how do you feel about that answer?

SAZAR

It's very excerptive.

Proton Soup

until someone gets interested enough to find out how much menthol it takes to kill spermatozoa, that's about as close as you can get, though. there, they're only interested in menthol's ability to activate the TRPM8 receptor, and in that dosage menthol does not appear to kill sperm.

well, and they're apparently interested in menthol initiating the acrosome reaction, which would render a certain percentage of the sperm sterile, even though they are not dead. so, maybe it reduces fertility, but you still haven't disclosed why you're interested in the question.