Institute of Anatomy, University of Bern, Bern, Switzerland.
J Thromb Haemost. 2012 Jun;10(6):979-84. doi: 10.1111/j.1538-7836.2012.04718.x.
In 1962, a rod-shaped cytoplasmic organelle of endothelial cells, later called the Weibel-Palade body, was serendipitously discovered by electron microscopy. It contains a set of parallel tubules and is wrapped in a membrane. Subsequent studies in the following decades established the unique localization of this organelle in endothelial cells of all vertebrates studied, meaning that it could serve as a marker of endothelial cells in tissue cultures. However, these studies did not reveal its functional significance, except for an indication that it could be related to an undefined thromboplastic substance. Twenty years after its discovery as a structural entity, it was shown by others that it houses von Willebrand factor and is thus clearly related to the coagulation system. In this review, I provide a personal historical account of the discovery and the subsequent limited work that I carried out on the organelle, putting it in the perspective of the current state of knowledge after half a century of research by many scientists.
1962 年，电子显微镜偶然发现了一种内皮细胞的杆状细胞质细胞器，后来被称为威贝尔-帕拉德小体。它包含一组平行的小管，并包裹在膜中。在接下来的几十年的研究中，确定了这种细胞器在所有研究的脊椎动物内皮细胞中的独特定位，这意味着它可以作为组织培养中内皮细胞的标志物。然而，这些研究除了表明它可能与一种未定义的血栓形成物质有关外，并没有揭示其功能意义。在发现其作为结构实体 20 年后，其他人表明它含有血管性血友病因子，因此与凝血系统有明显的关系。在这篇综述中，我提供了对该细胞器的发现和我随后进行的有限工作的个人历史叙述，并从发现至今半个世纪以来，许多科学家的研究现状的角度来看待这个问题。
