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. 1998 Jul 6;188(1):1-4.
doi: 10.1084/jem.188.1.1.

Medullary thymic epithelium: a mosaic of epithelial "self"?

A G Farr  1 , A Rudensky
Affiliations

Medullary thymic epithelium: a mosaic of epithelial "self"?

A G Farr et al. J Exp Med. .
No abstract available

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Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Distinctive epithelial components of the medullary thymic environment. (a) Epithelial cells lacking ultrastructural features of terminally differentiated epithelium and associated with basal laminae associated with major blood vessels in the medulla. These cells morphologically and phenotypically resemble subcapsular epithelium. (b) Hassal's bodies consisting of concentric whorls of stratified keratinizing epithelium. Well developed in human thymus, they are small and relatively sparse in the murine thymus. (c) Ciliated columnar epithelium is often associated with cystic structures in the medulla. Occasional cells possess large ciliated vacuoles. (d) Epithelial cells considered to be neuroendocrine, based on ultrastructural similarities of small electron-dense cytoplasmic granules with those observed in bona fide neurosecretory cells. These cells often have distinctive cytoplasmic vacuoles with microvilli projecting into the lumen of the vacuoles.
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