Transfer of male or female primordial germ cells of quail into chick embryonic gonads.

Blood from an individual quail embryo at stages 13-16, when primordial germ cells (PGCs) were in circulation, was taken from its marginal vein and transfused into the marginal vein of a chick embryo at stages 13-16. Both donor and recipient embryos were cultured in vitro until day 8 of development and their sex was determined by morphological and histological observations of the gonads. Sections of recipient gonads were stained immunohistochemically with QCR1 monoclonal antibody positive for quail PGCs but negative for chick PGCs. Donor and recipient embryos were sexed in 17 pairs which included all four sex combinations. Transferred PGCs, either female-derived ZW type or male-derived ZZ type, were observed in the gonads of both sexes of 15 recipient embryos. The population of donor PGCs ranged from 20 to over 2500. In all four sex combinations, there was a higher population in the left than the right gonad of the embryos.