LUTEAR CELLS AND HEN-FEATHERING. 



By ALICE M. BORING and T. H. MORGAN. 



{From the Peking Union Medical College, and the Department of Zoology, Columbia 



University, New York) 



(Received for publication. August 7, 1918.) 



In nearly all breeds of poultry the dorsal plumage of the male ' 

 differs from that of the female in length of certain feathers, in struc- 

 tural features, and in most breeds in color also. In the race of 

 Sebrights, on the other hand, the male is feathered like the female. 

 He is said to be hen-feathered. There are other breeds, such as the 

 Campines and Hamburghs, in which both cock-feathered and hen- 

 feathered adult males are known. 



It has recently been shown by Boring and Pearl^ that there are 

 groups of cells in the ovary of the hen (Fig. 1) that collect in the fol- 

 licles after the egg is set free, and produce there a yellow pigment 

 that reacts chemically in the same way as does the lutear pigment 

 of the corpus luteum of the mammal. They call these cells lutear 

 cells. 



Boring and Pearl have also shown that the lutear cells are absent 

 in the testes of adult male fowls. 



It has been convincingly demonstrated by Goodale,^ both for ducks 

 and fowls, that extirpation of the ovary leads to the assumption of 

 the full male plumage by the female. Whether the germinal material, 

 or the connective tissue of the stroma of the ovary, or the lutear cells 

 are responsible for the condition of the plumage of the female could not 

 be determined by ovariotomy alone. If, however, any element should 

 be found in the testes of the hen-feathered Sebright that was absent 

 from other cock-feathered breeds, and like any elements peculiar to 

 the female, then it would appear highly probable that these elements 



^Boring, A. M., and Pearl, R., Anat. Rec., 1917, xiii, 253; Pearl and Boring, 

 Am. J. Anat., 1918, xxiii, 1. 



^Goodale, H. D., Biol. Bull., 1910-11, xx, 35; Am. Nat., 1913, xlvii, 159; 

 J.Exp.ZooL, 1916, XX, 421. 



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