The road not taken?

Abstract

In this issue of Blood, Sanada et al unveil a clever new refinement of in vitro colony forming unit assay, which allows them to follow differentiation of individual cells along both megakaryocytic and erythroid (E) pathways. With this assay system, they developed a new purification strategy for identification of primary functional human megakaryocyte/erythroid progenitor (MEP) cells. The possession of this enrichment technique should facilitate investigators into exploring the mechanisms of commitment of human hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs) into specific cell lineages.