The long and the short of it: new insights on sperm length help demystify the complexities of sexual selection

Human sperm are approximately 6000(th) of a centimeter long, a small fraction of a man's total body length. By contrast, fruit fly (Drosophila spp.) sperm can reach nearly 6 cm, roughly twenty times the total length of their bodies. This dramatic variation in male reproductive biology is explored in a recent paper from the journal Nature.1 While the literature on sperm competition has for decades emphasized the fitness benefit males of many species accrue by producing small gametes in large quantities, understanding species whose males produce large gametes in small quantities while remaining competitive for fertilizations has until recently proven more difficult. Stefan Lüpold and colleagues suggest a solution to this “big-sperm paradox.”