Acoustic Microscopy for the Study of Microanatomy of Japanese Quail Embryos ( Coturnix coturnix japonica dom .) at Different Stages of Development

New techniques and approaches to research living organisms provide progress in biology and medicine. Development of visualization methods for non-invasive assessment of the organism’s volume microstructure is the most attractive. In this work, we propose an effective approach based on high-frequency acoustic microscopy to study the development of small laboratory animal embryos. Acoustic microscopy has several advantages—it is real-time and non-invasive, provides high natural contrast in soft tissues, and does not need extensive preparation of biological samples. Acoustic microscopy was applied to observe Japanese quail embryos (Coturnix coturnix japonica dom.) from the 3rd to the 11th day of its development. The results demonstrate the images of the whole embryo body and its individual parts (brain, eye, and wing) at different stages of ontogenesis. The acoustic images have been confirmed by micrographs of histological sections of the same embryo samples. The quantitative assessment of embryo ontogenesis is presented by in situ measurements of eye and skeleton from the 5th up to the 11th day of the development, when separate elements of the eye become visible and embryo skeleton ossification has occurred.