Characterization of the primo-vascular system in the abdominal cavity of lung cancer mouse model and its differences from the lymphatic system

• Published in: PloS one 2010-04, Vol.5 (4), p.e9940-e9940
• Main Authors: Yoo, Jung Sun, Ayati, M Hossein, Kim, Hong Bae, Zhang, Wei-bo, Soh, Kwang-Sup
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Abdomen; Abdomen - blood supply; Abdomen - pathology; Acupuncture; Anatomy; Animal models; Animals; Astronomy; Blood vessels; Blood Vessels - anatomy & histology; Blood Vessels - pathology; Cancer; Cell Biology; Channels; Collagen; Disease Models, Animal; Endothelial cells; Endothelium; Endothelium, Vascular; Evidence-Based Healthcare; Eye surgery; Gastric cancer; Glycoproteins; Health aspects; Histochemistry; Histopathology; Lung cancer; Lung diseases; Lung Neoplasms - blood supply; Lung Neoplasms - pathology; Lymphatic system; Lymphatic System - anatomy & histology; Melanoma; Mice; Nanoparticles; Neovascularization, Pathologic - pathology; Nodules; Nuclei; Oncology; Oncology/Lung Cancer; Organs; Peritoneum; Physics; Rodents; Surgery; Surgery/Surgical Oncology; Transplantation, Heterologous; Tumors; Vascular system; Xenografts
• ISSN: 1932-6203; 1932-6203
• DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0009940

Cancer growth and dissemination have been extensively studied for a long time. Nevertheless, many new observations on anatomy and histopathology of cancer events are still reported such as formation of a vasculogenic-like network inside aggressive tumors. In this research, new kinds of micro-conduits, named primo-vessels, were found inside the abdominal cavity of NCI-H460 lung cancer murine xenograft models. These vascular threads were largely distributed on the surfaces of various organs and were often connected to peritoneal tumor nodules. Histological and immunofluorescent investigations showed that the primo-vessels had characteristic features that were distinctively different from those of similar-looking lymphatic vessels. They had multiple channels surrounded with loose collageneous matrices, which is in contrast to the single-channel structure of other vascular systems. The rod-shaped nuclei aligned longitudinally along the channels were assumed to be the endothelial cells of the primo-vessels, but LYVE-1, a specific marker of lymphatics, was not expressed, which indicates a clear difference from lymphatic endothelial cells. Taken together these findings on and characterization of the novel threadlike vascular structures in cancer models may have important implications for cancer prognosis and for therapy.