Further Observations on the Blood-Testis Barrier in Monkeys

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Abstract
Tight junctions uniting adjacent Sertoli cells subdivide the monkey seminiferous epithelium into 1) basal and 2) adluminal compartments (Dym, 1973). Electron-opaque tracer studies demonstrate that types A and B spermatogonia and preleptotene and leptotene spermatocytes reside in the basal compartment of the seminiferous epithelium and that the more differentiated germ cells are located in the adluminal compartment. Late leptotene or early zygotene spermatocytes ascend in the epithelium from one compartment to the next and this occurs in stages IX-X of the cycle of the seminiferous epithelium. New Sertoli cell junctional complexes reform beneath these migrating germinal elements prior to the dissolution of the existing junctions above the cells. This temporal difference serves to seal the barrier during the germ cell migration. These results indicate that the initiation of meiosis occurs while the early spermatocytes (preleptotene and leptotene) are still in the basal compartment of the epithelium and may not require the special microenvironment provided by the Sertoli cells in the adluminal compartment.

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