Granulocytes

Background

Granulocytes are a category of white blood cells characterized by the presence of granules in their cytoplasm. They are also called polymorphonuclear leukocytes (PMN or PML) because of the varying shapes of the nucleus, which is usually lobed into three segments. In common parlance, the term polymorphonuclear leukocyte often refers specifically to neutrophil granulocytes — the most abundant of the granulocytes. Granulocytes or PMN are released from bone marrow by regulatory complement proteins.