Blood cell formation, known as hematopoiesis, begins with a hematopoietic stem cell (HSC), which can either "self-renew" and make more copies of itself or differentiate into either red blood cells, various types of white blood cells, or platelets. The genes that control proliferation and differentiation have been difficult to study using traditional gene disruption methods because loss of genes thought to be critical for this process often results in embryonic death, making it impossible to study the role of the gene of interest in mature animals.
Dr. Michael P. Cooke and colleagues from the Genomics Institute of the Novartis Research Foundation in San Diego found a way around this problem. The researchers used random mutagenesis and screening to find animals with hematopoiesis defects, and they used genetics to identify the causative gene. One line mapped to a mutation in the gene c-Myb, which has a known role in regulation of blood formation.
Interestingly, they found that c-Myb is not required for every step of hematopoiesis or for every type of blood cell. Instead, c-Myb is critical for very distinct steps in the formation of specific types of blood cells. Most surprisingly, the c-Myb mutants also had a dramatic increase in the total number of HSCs, suggesting that part of the normal function of c-Myb is to hold HSC multiplication in check.
These data suggest that c-Myb is a key regulator of hematopoiesis and ac
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Cell Press
31-Jan-2005