Optical coherence tomography as approach for the minimal invasive localization of the germinal disc in ovo before chicken sexing

In most industrial states a huge amount of newly hatched male layer chickens are usually killed immediately after hatching by maceration or gassing. The reason for killing most of the male chickens of egg producing races is their slow growth rate compared to races specialized on meat production. When the egg has been laid, the egg contains already a small disc of cells on the surface of the yolk known as the blastoderm. This region is about 4 - 5 mm in diameter and contains the information whether the chick becomes male or female and hence allows sexing of the chicks by spectroscopy and other methods in the unincubated state. Different imaging methods like sonography, 3D-X-ray micro computed tomography and magnetic resonance imaging were used for localization of the blastoderm until now, but found to be impractical for different reasons. Optical coherence tomography (OCT) enables micrometer-scale, subsurface imaging of biological tissue and could therefore be a suitable technique for an accurate localization. The intention of this study is to prove if OCT can be an appropriate approach for the precise in ovo localization.