Massive invasion of fetal lymphocytes into the mother's blood at induced abortion.
The proband, a healthy primipara, selected for study after she had asserted that she had not previously been pregnant, gave birth to a healthy girl with the karyotype 46,XX. In the 21st week of gestation, leukoagglutinin-stimulated mitoses from the proband's blood were 99% 46,XX and 1% 46,XY, the Y chromosome being identified by its quinacrine fluorescence. In two samples taken later in pregnancy no XY mitoses were found in the cultures, but on all three occasions brightly fluorescent Y chromatin in a proportion of the uncultured lymphocyte nuclei showed teh presence of XY cells in the proband's blood. High titers of cytotoxic anti-HL-A 3 were detected in the maternal serum before and after delivery. Our tentative interpretation is that the XY cells in the proband's blood emanated from a previous fetus that was legally aborted by curettage on the 10th week of an uneventful pregnancy and which the patient admitted to only after repeated questioning.
D000028:Abortion, Induced; D003601:Cytotoxicity Tests, Immunologic; D005260:Female; D005312:Fetal Blood; D005333:Fetus / Q000276:immunology*; D006680:HLA Antigens; D006801:Humans; D007621:Karyotyping; D008214:Lymphocytes / Q000276:immunology*; D008431:Maternal-Fetal Exchange; D008938:Mitosis; D011247:Pregnancy; D012728:Sex Chromatin; D012730:Sex Chromosomes
D006680:HLA Antigens