No apoptotic cell death of erythroid cells of erythroblastic islands in bone marrow of healthy rats.

A possibility of apoptotic cell death in erythropoietic regulation was examined by means of detailed light microscopical histoplanimetry, electron microscopy, the in situ nick-end labeling method, and an immunohistological method in the rat bone marrow. Serum erythropoietin concentrations were shown at normal levels. The erythroid series on a mature process presented several morphological features of apoptosis, i.e. the shrinkage of both nuclei and cytoplasm and the chromatin condensation. In the light microscopical histoplanimetry, however, morphological signs of final apoptotic cell death were never found in any erythroid cell within the erythroblastic islands. This finding was also supported by detailed ultrastructural observation: No erythroid cell bodies were trapped and degraded by the central macrophages of the erythroblastic islands, while the denucleated nuclei with small amount of cytoplasm of late erythroblasts were often trapped and degraded in the macrophages. Nuclear DNA fragmentation was not detected in any erythroblasts, but was detected in the lysosomes of the central macrophages. These findings suggest that erythropoiesis is regulated by other regulatory mechanisms than apoptotic cell death. An additional ultrastructural finding shows that the reticulocytes anchored to the central macrophages are transported into the peripheral blood circulation.