Maturation of Leukaemic Blast Cells

Abstract

The phagocytic ability and the proliferative activeity of leukaemic blast cells were investigated in 24 patients with actue leukaemia. A certain phagocytic activity was found in most cases of acute leukaemia. The highest phagocytic activity occurred in monocytic leukaemia. Blast cell populations with a relative high phagocytic activity showed a low proliferative activity and only a few cells in DNA synthesis. The blastcells with phagocytosis are more mature cells. We got the impression that they areresting cells and possibly end cells

Phagocytic Activity of Leukaemic Blasts

“…For the study of phagocytosis in acute leukaemia various material was used as indian ink [14,24], microbes [5,9,11], yeast [2,7,17], la tex particles [8] or white cells attacked by antinuclear factors [13]. In our laboratory ferrioxidsaccharate was chosen for two reasons mainly: it is easily ingested by the cell and the whole procedure does not require any elaborate equipment and can be performed in any haematological laboratory.…”