[Scanning and transmission microscopic observations on circulating primitive erythroblasts of yolk sac origin in the...

The earliest hemopoietic tissues which appear during the ontogeny of mammals are the blood islands of the yolk sac, and the blood cells produced therein begin to circulate between the embryo and visceral yolk sac at the establishment of the circulatory system. Primitive erythroblasts derived from the yolk sac have a short life span of only several days, and they form a majority of the embryonic blood cells prior to the start of liver hemopoiesis. To clarify cell fragmentation of primitive erythroblasts at the ultrastructural level, using 18 embryos of ICR-mice at 10 and 11 days of gestation, we observed circulating erythroblasts by scanning and transmission electron microscopy. The circulating erythroblasts generally had an irregularly ovoid contour, and they showed a great deal of micropinocytosis on their cell surface. The nuclei of the erythroblasts were round and possessed one or two nucleoli which were in contact with the nuclear membrane. Their nuclear chromatin was dispersed, and the cytoplasm was rich in polyribosomes and mitochondria. The majority of circulating erythroblasts were at the stage of either basophilic or polychromatophilic erythroblasts. Cytoplasmic projections could occasionally be seen extending from the erythroblast surface, and some of the projections appeared to be liberated into the vascular lumen as cell fragments. On the basis of their size and shape, the cytoplasmic projections could be classified into three types; finger-like projections, vesicular projections and microvesicular projections. The finger-like projections were approximately 1 micron in diameter and 3 microns in length. The vesicular projections, connected with the cell by a narrow stalk, were teardrop in shape, and approximately 0.8 microns in diameter and 1.5 microns in length. The microvesicular projections were approximately 0.2 microns in diameter and 0.2-0.5 microns in length. The finger-like projections had micropinocytotic invaginations on their surface, but no invaginations could be seen on the vesicular and microvesicular projections. Not only the finger-like but also the vesicular projections contained cytoplasmic matrix with a few polyribosomes. The microvesicular projections, on the other hand, occasionally contained myelinic-like figures. These projections were seen on the surface of erythroblasts at various maturation stages. The cytoplasmic fragments released from the erythroblasts were engulfed and eliminated from the embryonic peripheral blood by intravascular macrophages. The fragmentation of cytoplasmic projections was considered to be related to the development of microfilaments involved in the cytoskeleton of the erythroid elements.