The Pluripotency of the Pharyngeal Primordium in Urodelan Neurulæ1
It was for a long time taken for granted that determination of the primordia of the endodermal organs of Amphibia occurs prior to gastrulation (cf. Holtfreter, 1938 a, b; Stableford, 1948). There have been, however, some data which seem to conflict with this statement. For instance, after the extirpation of some endodermal primordium or primordia from neurulae or more advanced embryos of urodeles, the remaining endoderm shows regulative development into an almost complete digestive tract, no deficiency of any endodermal organs being encountered (Balinsky, 1948; Okada, 1953; Mikami & Murakawa, 1954). Moreover, when a small endodermal fragment from a gastrula or neurula is transplanted into a heterotopic site of another embryo, its resulting differentiation is not bedeutungsgemäss, but ortsgemäss in many cases (Balinsky, 1938, 1948). Judging from these findings, we cannot help concluding that each endodermal primordium is not in a state of final determination even after gastrulation, although, of course, it may be possible that labile determination has already begun at a much earlier stage.