Increased Iodine Uptake by Obese Strain Thyroid Glands Transplanted to Normal Chick Embryos

The Obese strain (OS) of chickens spontaneously develops autoimmune thyroiditis. Since a defect or abnormality of the thyroid gland may be involved in this disease experiments were performed to compare the iodine uptake of OS with normal thyroid glands. To minimize the interaction of the OS immune system with the thyroid gland during these studies, thyroids were removed from 16-day-old embryos and transferred to the chorioallantoic membrane (CAM) of 9-day-old normal White Leghorn (NWL) embryos. NWL thyroid glands were transferred to the same CAM. Six days later the 20-hr 131 I uptake of the transplants was determined. Twenty OS thyroid lobes had a mean 131 I uptake of 2960 ± 740 cpm, whereas the NWL thyroids incorporated significantly less iodine (890 ± 160 cpm; p