Blood-Group Factors in the Blood, Organs and Secretions of Primates

Abstract

Summary: Supplementing a previous report on the blood-group factors in infrahuman primates, a method is described for examining the blood, organs and secretions. Additional data are also presented, in particular with regard to gorillas and two species of New World monkeys. Landsteiner's rule was found to hold in infrahuman primates with the modification that the reciprocal relationship obtains between agglutinins in the serum and group-substances in the organs and secretions instead of the erythrocytes. In monkeys and apes, each species appears to be characterized in the main by a single group-factor. The implications of these results for the problem of the distribution of the blood groups in man are discussed.