Definition of "reticulocyte" [reticulocyte]

• An immature red blood cell that contains a network of basophilic filaments. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "We assumed that the same mechanism that is involved in differentiation and maturation of the reticulocyte is also involved in the removal of "naturally occurring" mutant abnormal hemoglobins that are synthesized in different hemoglobinopathies, such as thalassemias and sickle cell anemia, and also in the destruction of the amino acid analogs"
• "A later stage of the cell known as a reticulocyte, is what finally develops into an erythrocyte."
• "The progenitor cell loses its nucleus, and most of its intracellular membranes are degraded; the now non-nucleated form of the cell, termed a reticulocyte, then loses its ribosomes, thus preventing any further synthesis of haemoglobin."