Bone Abstracts

Osteoclasts are giant multinucleated skeletal cells of hematopoietic origin primarily responsible for bone resorption. Their functional impairment disturbs bone homeostasis and, to a variable extent, a number of other processes, such as growth, hematopoiesis and immune function. The accumulation of bone tissue owing to failure in bone resorption results in increased bone density, which is the hallmark of osteopetrosis (OP), a heterogeneous group of monogenic disorders with aut...

Osteoclast-poor RANKL-dependent autosomal recessive osteopetrosis (ARO) is a rare bone disease characterized by an increase in bone density due to the failure of bone resorption by impaired osteoclast formation. Haematopoietic stem cell transplantation is not an effective therapy for this ARO form, since in bone RANKL is produced mainly by cells of mesenchymal origin. Whether also these cells, besides the osteoclast, are in some way affected by RANKL deficiency is not known. T...