Thrombopoietin and its receptor (Mpl) support survival and proliferation in megakaryocyte progenitors and in BaF3 cells engineered to stably express Mpl (BaF3/Mpl). The binding of thrombopoietin to Mpl activates multiple kinase pathways, including the Jak/STAT, Ras/Raf/MAPK, and phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase pathways, but it is not clear how these kinases promote cell cycling. Here, we show tha...

Thrombopoietin (TPO) is the major regulator of both growth and differentiation of megakaryocytes. We previously showed that both functions can be generated by TPO in the megakaryoblastic cell line UT7, in which murine Mpl was introduced, and are independently controlled by distinct regions of the cytoplasmic domain of Mpl. Particularly, residues 71 to 94 of this domain (deleted in the mutant mp...

Mpl ligand (thrombopoietin [TPO]) is the physiological regulator of platelet production. In mice, mRNA encoding the Mpl ligand (Mpl-L) is predominantly found by Northern blot analysis in the liver and kidney. To investigate the mode of regulation of the Mpl-L gene, we have developed several experimental models of severe thrombocytopenia differing in their kinetics and an opposite model of chron...

P ronounced thrombocytosis can result from decreased expression of the thrombopoietin (Tpo) receptor, Mpl, in late megakaryocytes and platelets. In this issue of Blood, Lannutti and colleagues1 and Tiedt and colleagues2 generate transgenic mice expressing Mpl and use these models to investigate the relationships between Mpl, expression and platelet production. In these mouse models, a 2 kb prox...

The chronic myeloproliferative disorders (MPD) are clonal hematopoietic stem cell disorders of unknown etiology. We have reported defective thrombopoietin receptor (Mpl) protein expression in MPD patients. To determine whether the basis of abnormal Mpl protein expression was due to mutations in the Mpl gene, we sequenced Mpl cDNA from MPD patients. We found a single nucleotide substitution (G12...

Megakaryopoiesis is an original and complex cell process which leads to the formation of platelets. The homeostatic production of platelets is mainly regulated and controlled by thrombopoietin (TPO) and the TPO receptor (MPL)/JAK2 axis. Therefore, any hereditary or acquired abnormality affecting this signaling axis can result in thrombocytosis or thrombocytopenia. Thrombocytosis can be due to g...