Cellular individuality in the higher animals, with special reference to the individuality of the red blood corpuscle. (II)

Abstract

When ''a family of Plymouth Rock fowls is examined by means of exhausted immune iso-agglutinating sera, the corpuscles of no 2 chicks appear to be exactly alike; cells of different individuals show degrees of difference in immunological behavior, which may vary from close resemblance to very marked contrast. Individual chicks may be immunized with blood of brothers or sisters and yield active but highly specific agglutinating sera. The case with which such agglutinins are formed seems to vary with degree of difference in character between corpuscles of injected fowl and those used for immunization. The erythrocyte must be regarded as a "multiple antigen" in the sense that it contains a large number of different antigenic units or "receptors," which apparently behave as independent units when hereditarily transmitted.