Ultrasonic Freezing of Reproductive Materials

The reproductive materials of vertebrate animals, including sperm, ova, and embryos, are routinelyfrozen state by a process called cryopreservation. Currently, an essential part of the cryopreservatof chemical preservative agents to these materials to prevent cell damage during freezing. This damaformation of ice crystals within the cells. As these crystals enlarge, they rupture the cell walls aPreservative agents prevent this damage from occurring by dehydrating the cells before they are frozhowever, are also poisonous to the cells over long time periods. The goal of this project is to devebiological tissues with minimum cell damage, while avoiding the use of preservative agents. The propbased on the accepted principles of cryopreservation and cryodestruction, combined with the acceptedinteraction of ultrasound with liquids. The proposed Phase I research consists of gathering the datadevelopment of commercial technology later in Phase II. If successful, the range of commercial applitechnology includes the long term storage of all soft biological tissues that are composed mostly of