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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2022 Apr 1.
Published in final edited form as: Trends Mol Med. 2020 Oct 26;27(4):332–344. doi: 10.1016/j.molmed.2020.10.001

Figure 1: Comparison of normal and leukemic myeloid hematopoietic hierarchies.

Figure 1:

Hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs) self-renew and primarily exist in a glycolytic state during quiescence but switch to oxidative phosphorylation (OXPHOS) upon differentiation. HSCs differentiate into multipotent progenitors (MPPs), which lose the ability to self-renew but have increased frequency of cell cycle progression and differentiation activity. The MPP then differentiates to a common myeloid progenitor (CMP), which can become a megakaryocyte–erythroid progenitor (MEP), generating erythrocytes and platelets, or a granulocyte-macrophage progenitor (GMP), generating granulocytes. Both HSCs, MPPs, and CMPs can potentially become a leukemic stem cell (LSC) through the acquisition of transforming mutations. LSCs also have the capacity for self-renewal and are uniquely reliant on OXPHOS. They differentiate to produce leukemic blasts, which lose the ability to self-renew but can use both glycolysis and OXPHOS. While leukemic blasts are sensitive to traditional chemotherapy, LSCs require targeted therapies for their eradication. Created with BioRender.com.