Haematopoietic stem cells retain long-term repopulating activity and multipotency in the absence of stem-cell leukaemia SCL/tal-1 gene
The production of blood cells is sustained throughout the lifetime of an individual by haematopoietic stem cells (HSCs). Specification of HSCs from mesoderm during embryonic development requires the stem cell leukaemia SCL/tal-1 gene product. Forced expression of SCL/tal-1 strongly induces blood formation in embryos, indicating that this gene has a dominant role in commitment to haematopoiesis. In
