Binding and suppressive activity of human recombinant ferritins on erythroid cells.

We studied the relation between ferritin cellular binding and suppressive activity of recombinant H- and L-ferritin on human erythroid cells at different proliferation/differentiation phases. L-ferritin failed to show any suppressive activity or detectable binding to erythroblasts at any stage of maturation. In contrast, H-ferritin demonstrated binding to erythroblasts derived from peripheral BFU-E cells which increased steadily between 7-14 days of culture up to 15,000 molecules per cell. Reticulocytes and erythrocytes failed to bind either L- or H-ferritin. H-ferritin suppressed BFU-E colony formation and reduced K562 cell proliferation at nanomolar concentrations. This suggests that the expression of H-ferritin binding sites is modulated by cellular proliferation and differentiation, that cells expressing H-ferritin binding sites are sensitive to ferritin suppressive activity and that a causal relation exists between ferritin cellular binding and suppressive activity.