Thrombopoiesis comes full circle

In this issue of Blood, Wu et al 1 study the function of circular RNA (circRNA) in platelet production.Following a trail of evidence that began with the observation that megakaryocytes and platelets express high levels of one particular circRNA, circFUT8, the team discovered that circFUT8 interacts with insulin-like growth factor 2 messenger RNA (mRNA) binding protein 2 (IGF2BP2) to promote the stabilization of tensin 1 (TNS1) mRNA (see figure).This mechanism exemplifies 1 function of circRNA, which is to modulate mRNA stability.