Book - The Eggs of Mammals (1936)

Author: Pincus, Gregory, 1903-1967 Subject: Ovum; Embryology -- Mammals; Mammals -- physiology; Ovum Publisher: New York, The Macmillan Company Year: 1936 http://archive.org/details/eggsofmammals00pinc

THE EGGS OF MAMMALS

EXPERIMENTAL BIOLOGY SERIES

Editors: Philip Bard, Johns Hopkins University; L. R. Blinks, Stanford University; W. B. Cannon, Harvard University; W. J. Crozier, Harvard University; J. B. Collip, McGill University; Hallowell Davis, Harvard University; S. R. Detwiler, Columbia University; Selig Hecht, Columbia University; Hudson Hoagland, Clark University; J. H. Northrop, Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research; G. H. Parker, Harvard University; Gregory Pincus. Harvard University; L. J. Stadler, The University of Missouri; Sewall Wright, University of Chicago.

PACEMAKERS IN RELATION TO ASPECTS OF BEHAVIOR. By Hudson Hoagland

NEUROEMBRYOLOGY. By Samuel R. Detwiler

THE EGGS OF MAMMALS. By Gregory Pincus

Other volumes to follow

1

THE EGGS OF MAMMALS

BY GREGORY PINCUS

Assistant Professor of General Physiology Harvard University

NEW YORK

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY

1936

Copyright, 1936, By the MACMILLAN" COMPANY

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED NO PART OF THIS BOOK MAY BE

REPRODUCED IN ANY FORM WITHOUT PERMISSION IN WRITING FROM THE PUBLISHER, EXCEPT BY A REVIEWER WHO WISHES TO QUOTE BRIEF PASSAGES IN CONNECTION WITH A REVIEW WRITTEN FOR INCLUSION IN MAGAZINE OR NEWSPAPER

Published, August, 1936

SET UP AND ELECTROTYPED BY T. MOREY * SON PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

This Book Is Dedicated to W. E. Castle and W. J. Crazier

PREFACE

I should like to express my appreciation to Dr. J. B. Collip, Dr. H. Selye, Dr. D. L. Thomson, and Dr. W. J. Crozier for their kindness in reading the manuscript of this book before publication. Their comments have been taken advantage of in a manner for which I, not they, am responsible. I am indebted too to Dr. F. H. A. Marshall and Mr. John Hammond of Cambridge University for encouragement and interest which led to the undertaking of this monograph, and to my friend and collaborator Dr. E. V. Enzmann who actively assisted in a number of the investigations herein described. The National Research Council Committee for Problems of Sex and the Josiah Macy Jr. Foundation provided grants making possible most of my own work, and the preparation of the monograph itself is due in no small measure to their assistance. To the editors and publishers of the following journals I am indebted for permission to reprint the various tables and figures indicated in the text: the American Journal of Anatomy, the American Journal of Physiology, the Anatomical Record, Archives de Biologic, the Biological Bulletin, the Carnegie Institution of Washington Publications in Embryology, the Journal of Anatomy, the Journal of Experimental Biology, the Journal of Experimental Medicine, the Journal of Experimental Zoology, the Journal of Morphology, the Quarterly Review of Biology, and the Proceedings of the Royal Society.

I ask the understanding of the reader if this account of the development of mammalian eggs seems at times to deal in summary fashion with some of the voluminous literature on this subject. The investigative aspects are what interest and intrigue me. I emerge confessedly with the impression that at best a qualitative basis for future work has been estabhshed, and since I am possessed by the belief that

viii PREFACE

accurate quantitative observatioDs afford the means for elucidating the nature of biological processes, I feel that this is a book of interrogation, not explanation. If it does indeed create curiosity its major objective will be attained.

Gregory Pincus

Cambridge, Mass. July, 1936.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

PAGE

Preface vu

CHAPTER

I. Introduction 1

II. The Origin of the Definitive Ova 5

III. The Growth of the Ovum 32

IV. The Development and Atresia of Full-Grown Ova and

the Problem of Ovarian Parthenogenesis ... 42

V. Methods Employed in the Experimental ]\Ianipula tion of ^Mammalian Ova 62

VI. The Tubal History of Unfertilized Eggs .... 68

VIL Fertilization and Cleavage 75

VIII. The Activation of Unfertilized Eggs 98

IX. The Growth and Implantation of the Blastodermic

Vesicle 112

X. Summary and Recapitulation 128

Bibliography 131

Author Index 155

Subject Index 159