Some anomalies in the genital organs of Bufo lentiginosus and their probable significance / by Helen Dean King.

  • King, Helen Dean, 1869-1955.
Date:
1910
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Some anomalies in the genital organs of Bufo lentiginosus and their probable significance / by Helen Dean King. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    each has the structure typical of the normal Bidder’s organ. Most of the large bodies found along the course of the sex-glands (Figs. 6, 13, 16) also appear similar in structure to Bidder’s organ, and they are directly connected above and below with germ-cell tissue that appears normal in every respect. The structure of many of the smaller bodies found on the sex- glands does not conform strictly to that of Bidder’s organ. Fig. 17 shows a longitudinal section of the enlargement on the lower part of the left ovary, which is outlined in Fig. 10. The ovarian wall has a perfectly normal structure here as in other parts of the sex-gland, being composed of cysts of secondary oogonia and of oocytes in the synizesis stage of development (Fig. 17, S.). In the cavity of the ovary is a mass of large cells inclosed by follicle cells and a thin membrane. These large cells have all of the char- acteristics of the large rudimentary ova normally found in Bidder’s organ; they do not bear the slightest resemblance to the oogonia and oocytes of which the ovarian wall is composed. A somewhat different arrangement of tissues is shown in Fig. 18 which is a drawing of a transverse section through the smaller of the two bodies on the right testis outlined in Fig. 2. Here the spermato- gonial tissue does not inclose the group of cells which appear like rudimentary ova, but is collected together at one side of it and the cells are surrounded in great part only by a thin covering of mesen- tery. A similar condition of the tissues was found in the enlarge- ments of the testes shown in outline in Figs. 8 and 15. As a rule only the enlarged portions of the sex-glands contain any of the large cells which appear like rudimentary ova, in all other parts the glands have a normal structure. In but one instance have I found cells of this character among germ-cells when their presence was not shown by an examination of the sex-gland under a dissecting lens. In this case the cavity of one of the ovaries in a young female contained three of these large cells which were sepa- rated a considerable distance and thus gave no external evidence of their presence. During the course of my investigations on the toad (King,