The primordial germ cells (PGCs) are the precursors for both the oocytes and spermatogonia.
Recently, a novel culture system was established for chicken PGCs, isolated from embryonic
blood. The possibility of PGC long-term cultivation issues a new advance in germ cell
preservation, biotechnology, and cell biology. We investigated the consequence of
gga-miR-302b-5P (5P), gga-miR-302b-3P (3P) and dual inhibition (5P/3P) in two male
and two female chicken PGC lines. In treated and control cell cultures, the cell number
was calculated every four hours for three days by the XLS Imaging system. Comparing
the cell number of control and treated lines on the first day, we found that male
lines had a higher proliferation rate independently from the treatments. Compared
to the untreated ones, the proliferation rate and the number of apoptotic cells were
considerably reduced at gga-miR-302b-5P inhibition in all PGC lines on the third day
of the cultivation. The control PGC lines showed a significantly higher proliferation
rate than 3P inhibited lines on Day 3 in all PGC lines. Dual inhibition of gga-miR-302b
mature miRNAs caused a slight reduction in proliferation rate, but the number of apoptotic
cells increased dramatically. The information gathered by examining the factors affecting
cell proliferation of PGCs can lead to new data in stem cell biology.
