Poultry Studies 2019, Vol 16, Num, 1     (Pages: 019-022)

Gender Determination of Ten Days Chick Embryo by PCR

Muhammet Kaya 1 ,Samed Konucuk 2

1 Department of Agricultural Biotechnology, Faculty of Agriculture, Eskişehir Osmangazi University, 26160 Eskişehir, Turkey
2 Agricultural Genetic Engineering, Ömer Halisdemir University, Faculty of Agricultural Sciences and Technologies, 51240 Niğde, Turkey
DOI : 10.34233/jpr.481680 - Sex of one-day-old chicks are determined by feather characteristics (length or colour) of the breed or line, or vent sexing by highly trained specialist. DNA-based methods are being developed to accurately identify sex in early period of the chick embryos. One of these is the PCR method in which primers are designed according to the sequences of poultry sex chromosomes (ZZ male and ZW female). In this study, Xhol repeat sequence on the W chromosome and specific DNA sequences of the 18S ribosomal gene were amplified by PCR using DNA obtained from amniotic fluid of 10 day old embryos (n=30). On the band image of the gel PCR products, samples generating a single band (256 bp) were determined as male and samples giving two bands (256 and 415 bp) were determined as females. The gender determination in the early stages of the chick embryo can be done accurately and fast by PCR method. Keywords : Sex Determination Embryo Fowl PCR DNA