Achieving successful primordial germ cell (PGC)-based genome editing requires a deep understanding of their molecular identity. For the first time, a comparative transcriptomic analysis of chicken PGCs and adult liver cells to define their specific gene expression signature was performed. PGCs were isolated from Rhode Island Red chicken embryos, cultured, and subjected to RNA sequencing alongside liver tissue. Differential expression analysis with Benjamini–Hochberg correction identified 1909 differentially expressed genes (DEGs). Functional annotation revealed that PGCs possess a unique transcriptional landscape, characterized not only by enhanced proliferation and metabolic activity but also by a profound molecular convergence with neural crest cells. This is evidenced by the upregulation of gene modules governing long-range migration, neuronal signaling, and specialized “neuro-lipid” metabolism (e.g., sphingolipid and plasmalogen pathways). Additionally, we identified unannotated transcripts linked to immune pathways and ciliary signaling. Our study expands the functional annotation of avian PGCs and reveals an unexpected evolutionary recruitment of conserved morphogenetic programs, providing a refined molecular foundation for advanced germline editing technologies.
Azovtseva et al. (Fri,) studied this question.