Characterization of the synthetic capacities of isolated placental binucleate cells from sheep and goats

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Abstract
Sheep and goat binucleate cells (BNC) play a central role in placental growth and development. This study reports a simple method for isolating 60‐70% pure populations of BNC of high viability. After incubation of the isolated BNC with a brief pulse of 14C‐leucine or 3H‐fucose or 3H‐galactose, electron microscope autoradiography showed that label was eventually incorporated into the characteristic BNC granules via the Golgi body. Fucose and galactose initially showed a much higher Golgi body label than leucine, which was at first predominantly localised in the endoplasmic reticulum. 35S‐methionine incorporation by BNC suspensions was extensive enough to allow an immunoprecipitation investigation which demonstrated that the protein hormone ovine placental lactogen and the SBU‐3 antigen were synthesised de novo. Previous studies with isolated BNC have shown a remarkable range of substances to be released into the incubation medium but not necessarily synthesised during the incubation. The results demonstrate unequivocally that isolated BNC's are capable of total synthesis in vitro of two of the proteins that these same cells are known to secrete in vivo.
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