Abstract
THE demonstration of sex chromatin has become an important aspect of human genetics, both for practical reasons, and for the purpose of establishing the theoretical relationship between sex chromatin and the X-chromosome. The term ‘sex chromatin’ comprises two superficially dissimilar structures : (1) the Barr body, present in epithelial and other tissue cells ; (2) the drumstick of the polymorphonuclear leucocytes. A drumstick consists of a small nuclear mass, about 1.5µ in diameter, which is attached to the body of the nucleus by means of a thin filament1 (Fig. 1). Drumsticks may occur in any of the three types of polymorphonuclear leucocytes, but for practical purposes only those present in neutrophils are considered. It is now generally accepted that the drumstick is an expression of an X-chromosome in cells in which more than one are present2,3 and this means that drumsticks and Barr bodies are equivalent structures. Nevertheless, the interpretation of drumsticks in patients with chromosomal abnormalities has sometimes given rise to difficulties, which have not been encountered in relation to Barr bodies. For example, patients with Klinefelter's syndrome have an incidence of drumsticks which is lower than that found in normal females4 whereas the frequency of Barr bodies is not decreased. Again, a considerable proportion of epithelial cells in patients with three X chromosomes contain two Barr bodies, but the occurrence of two drumsticks within the same cell must be regarded as a rarity5–7. These discrepancies between drumsticks and Barr bodies are due to at least three causes : (1) low incidence of drumsticks, which in normal women is on the average less than three per 100 neutrophils ; (2) wide variation in the frequency of drumsticks in different women ; (3) the fact that the incidence of drumsticks is to some extent determined by the degree of segmentation of the nuclei of the polymorphonuclear leucocytes1.
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MITTWOCH, U. Frequency of Drumsticks in Normal Women and in Patients with Chromosomal Abnormalities. Nature 201, 317–319 (1964). https://doi.org/10.1038/201317a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/201317a0
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