26 September 2018
Blood flow forces liver growth
Sina Y. Rabbany & Shahin Rafii
Increases in biomechanical forces in the liver’s blood vessels have now been shown to activate two mechanosensitive proteins. The proteins trigger blood-vessel cells to deploy regenerative factors that drive liver growth.
The molecular pathways that initiate and sustain liver growth during development and after injury are orchestrated in part by a balanced supply of stimulatory and inhibitory factors secreted from specialized liver sinusoidal endothelial cells (LSECs), which line the organ’s blood vessels1–4. But it is unclear how the liver vasculature senses the need to produce these endothelial-cell-derived (angiocrine) growth factors, such as hepatocyte growth factor (HGF) and Wnt proteins, to guide proper organ growth4. In a paper in Nature, Lorenz et al.5 show how mechanical forces created by the passage of blood through the liver activate signalling pathways that promote the production of angiocrine factors and the proliferation of the organ’s main cell type, hepatocytes, in mice.
Continue reading online @ Nature
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