Medical Laboratory and Biomedical Science: Megakaryocytes put a foot through the door

Friday, March 29, 2013

Megakaryocytes put a foot through the door

Megakaryocytes in the hematopoietic niche extrude thin proplatelet processes or “arms” that pass through blood vessel walls, enter their lumen, and release platelets into the circulation. Precisely how proplatelet arms work their way into blood vessels is poorly understood. In this issue of Blood, Schachtner and colleagues¹ show that megakaryocytes respond to extracellular matrices (ECMs) by assembling podosomes, specialized plasma membrane structures that promote cell motility and invasiveness, suggesting their potential role in proplatelet arm extension across basement membranes.

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Megakaryocytes put a foot through the door