Palladin-deficient embryos show severe anemia. (A) Viability of Palld^−/− embryos. The percentage of viable Palld^−/− embryos (of the total viable embryos collected) is shown as a function of increasing gestational age. All embryos were derived from Palld^+/− intercrosses, so 25% would be expected to be Palld^−/−. The analysis was performed on a pure 129SvJ background. At each time point, 40 to 200 embryos were analyzed. (B) An anemic Palld^−/− E13.5 embryo and its wt control. (C) Hematocrit values for wt (n = 5) and Palld^−/− (n = 5) E13.5 embryos. Error bar represents plus and minus a standard deviation (SD); **P < .01. (D) Peripheral blood counts of wt and Palld^−/− E13.5 and E14.5 mouse embryos. Palld^−/− embryos exhibit decreased definitive erythrocytes (eryDs) but not primitive erythrocytes (eryPs). (E) Wright-Giemsa staining of peripheral blood smears of wt and Palld^−/− embryos at E13.5; Palld^−/− peripheral blood contains much less enucleated red blood cells. Images were viewed with an Olympus BX51 microscope with an Olympus UPlanFl 40×/0.75 objective, captured with a SPOT RTKE cooled color CCD camera (Diagnostic Instruments, Sterling Heights, MI), and imported into SPOT software (Diagnostic Instruments). Original magnification, × 400.