Significance Although many platelet glycoproteins, such as GPIbα and GPIIb/IIIa, are predominately modified by O-glycans, the biological importance of O-glycans in platelet homeostasis is unclear. Here, we report that platelets lacking O-glycans exhibit a reduced life-span and increased clearance in the liver due to defective sialylation. We found that Kupffer cells play a major role in clearing desialylated O-glycan–deficient platelets in cooperation with hepatocytes via the hepatic asialoglycoprotein receptor. These findings reveal how O-glycosylation regulates platelet homeostasis and clearance; they may also provide insights into the pathogenesis of disorders with thrombocytopenia such as sepsis and immune thrombocytopenia refractory to splenectomy.
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Li et al. (2017) studied this question.