Sel’skokhozyaistvennaya Biologiya [Agricultural Biology], 2012, № 6, p. 61-65 UDK 636.52/.58:591.324:576.3/.7.086.83:591.04 1 All-Russia Research and Development Institute for Livestock Husbandry, RAAS, Dubrovitsy settlement 142132, Moscow province, Russia e-mail: natavolkova@inbox.ru, n_zinovieva@mail.ru ISOLATION AND CHARACTERISTICS OF PRIMORDIAL GERM CELLS IN CHICKEN Е. <...> Trypsinization (with 0.05 % trypsin) was found to be the most effective method of disaggregation in chick embryos for isolation of their embryonic cells. <...> The maximum number of primordial germs cells can be isolated from 6 days-old embryos, followed by separation of the resulting cell suspension by adhesion after 90 minutes of their cultivation with the use of chicken embryonic fibroblasts as feeder layer. <...> During incubation of primordial germ cells on feeder layer cells remained viable for a longer time, and ranged from 5 to 7 days, depending on the type of cells used as feeder layer (finite cell line STO, recently separated and incubated for several passages in chicken embryo fibroblasts). <...> A significant current advance in creation of transgenic bird has been obtained through the use of various methods of gene transfer (1-7), but production of transgenic chickens is still concerned to certain problems. <...> Peculiarities of bird reproduction and development (8) reduce the efficiency of microinjection commonly performed on animal cells, which necessitates applying some alternative methods of directed gene transfer. <...> One of such methodological approaches is actively developed in recent years – using pluripotent stem cells (PSC) of different types (including primordial germ cells - predecessors of differentiated germ cells) as target cells for the transfer of recombinant DNA (9). <...> Genetic modification of primordial germ cells (PGCs) with following transplantation into chicken embryos in vivo is considered as a promising method for target genetic modification of bird gonads and creation of transgenic bird. <...> In this connection, the subject of this research was isolation and characterization of primordial germ cells of chickens as target cells for genetic engineering. <...> Experiments were performed on chicken embryos the cross Ptichnoe at developmental stages from the 4th to 8th day of incubation. <...> Disaggregation of the embryos was performed using two methods: mechanical dissociation of cells and enzymatic treatment of tissues. <...> Dissociation of the cells was performed <...>