Sperm penetration tests check to see whether a man's sperm can move through cervical mucus and the fallopian tubes to join with (fertilize) an egg. This test is usually done when a couple is having trouble becoming pregnant (infertility). There are different sperm penetration tests.
The idea that a boundary is shifting can be applied to different areas. A shifting frontier of science would be referring to the fact that science is always changing and growing, and always with new areas. In wartime, a shifting frontier would be an international border which is constantly being renegotiated.
Declared land from the headwaters of rivers flowing into the Atlantic from the Appalachian Mountains to be the temporary western boundary for colonial settlement in an attempt to prevent conflict between them and Native Americans; doomed to fail because never enforced.