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(Circulation Research. 2002;91:e1.)
© 2002 American Heart Association, Inc.

Letters to the Editor

Transdifferentiation, a Potential Mechanism for Covering Vascular Grafts Grown Within Recipient’s Peritoneal Cavity With Endothelial-Like Cells

N.I. Moldovan

Davis Heart and Lung Institute and, Biomedical Engineering Center, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio, moldovan-1@medctr.osu.edu

K. Havemann

Institute for Molecular Biology and, Tumor Research, Philips-University, Marburg, Germany

An extract of the first 250 words of the full text is provided, because this article has no abstract.

To the Editor:

We found the study by Campbell et al¹ to be very interesting, and we believe that it deserves the full attention of the tissue engineering and vascular biology scientific communities. This study offers a promising way of growing self-compatible vascular replacements, at a time when the need for transplantable vessels increases constantly.

This approach was recently criticized in a Letter to the Editor published in Circulation Research, on the grounds that the cells covering the graft are not "true" endothelial cells. However, what Cebotari et al² documented was "a typical inflammatory reaction to the foreign body, and the cells present on the silastic tube surface are in fact inflammatory cells and do not carry a typical endothelial function." While replicating the major finding reported by Campbell et al,¹ ie, the repopulation of implanted graft scaffolds in the given time period, Cebotari et al found that the supposed endothelial cells stained positively for CD31 and CD18, two "specific markers for leukocytes." However, Cebotari et al also found that <5% of these cells were able to take up acetylated LDL.

In fact, Campbell et al¹ did not claim that the intimal cells in their construct were "endothelial" but rather "mesothelial." Nevertheless, these cells stained positively for von Willebrand factor and, as shown by Cebotari et al,² for CD31 (PECAM-1) as well. It can therefore be argued that the cells stained positively for two typical markers of endothelial cells. The other marker, CD18, suggests that these intimal cells may indeed be derived . . . [Full Text of this Article]

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