Bone marrow stromal cells and their factors regulate B-cell differentiation

The bone marrow is the only tissue in which myeloid cells and B lymphocytes normally differentiate during postnatal life. This suggests that influences essential to the process of differentiation operate in the medullary cavity. It is now accepted that a population of bone marrow stromal cells provides the necessary environment for hemopoiesis and there is much interest in their regulatory effects- studies which have been assisted by methods of analysing stromal cell biology in vitro. Considerable recent progress has been made in understanding how stromal cells regulate B lymphopoiesis, a subject discussed at a recent conference.