Histology of the Blood Normal and Pathological

by Dr. Paul Ehrlich

Excerpt: ...the corresponding conditions in human blood. The distinction in the latter is more difficult, since it is not evident in this case that the fully formed polynuclear neutrophil leucocytes have a twofold origin: for the majority wander fully formed from the bone-marrow into the blood, and only a considerably smaller number grow to maturity within the blood-stream from the mononuclear and transitional forms. No definite statement can as yet be made as to the places of formation of the non-granulated large ... Read More

Excerpt: ...the corresponding conditions in human blood. The distinction in the latter is more difficult, since it is not evident in this case that the fully formed polynuclear neutrophil leucocytes have a twofold origin: for the majority wander fully formed from the bone-marrow into the blood, and only a considerably smaller number grow to maturity within the blood-stream from the mononuclear and transitional forms. No definite statement can as yet be made as to the places of formation of the non-granulated large mononuclear leucocytes. Kurloff has demonstrated, that in the guinea-pig these cells are present both in the bone-marrow and in the spleen, but that after extirpation of the spleen the absolute number does not change. The bone-marrow Pg 113 then in the guinea-pig can also preserve the balance of the large mononuclear, non-granular cells in the blood. The numbers we found in our blood investigations in man after splenectomy were also normal. We may then doubtless assume that the large mononuclear granuleless cells of human blood also arise for the most part from the bone-marrow. In this tissue they are to be picked out in the medley of the different kinds of cells only with the utmost difficulty, owing to their small number and their but little characteristic properties. Consequently an exact investigation of their origin could probably only be successful if it were possible experimentally to produce a disease in which these forms in particular underwent important increase. This advance is not quite hopeless, since in man at least an absolute increase of the large mononuclear cells is observed in the post-febrile stage of measles. On the grounds merely of microscopical investigations we conclude that the bone-marrow is by far the most important of the blood-forming organs, for its function is the exclusive production of red blood discs as well as of the chief group of the white corpuscles, the polynuclear neutrophil. The physiological, experimental... Read Less