title: Vascular lumen formation.
abstract: The vascular system developed early in evolution. It is required in large multicellular organisms for the transport of nutrients, oxygen, and waste products to and from tissues. The vascular system is composed of hollow tubes, which have a high level of complexity in vertebrates. Vasculogenesis describes the de novo formation of blood vessels, e.g., aorta formation in vertebrate embryogenesis. In contrast, angiogenesis is the formation of blood vessels from preexisting ones, e.g., sprouting of intersomitic blood vessels from the aorta. Importantly, the lumen of all blood vessels in vertebrates is lined and formed by endothelial cells. In both vasculogenesis and angiogenesis, lumen formation takes place in a cord of endothelial cells. It involves a complex molecular mechanism composed of endothelial cell repulsion at the cell-cell contacts within the endothelial cell cords, junctional rearrangement, and endothelial cell shape change. As the vascular system also participates in the course of many diseases, such as cancer, stroke, and myocardial infarction, it is important to understand and make use of the molecular mechanisms of blood vessel formation to better understand and manipulate the pathomechanisms involved.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Metabolic Physiology, Heinrich-Heine-University of Düsseldorf, D-40225 Düsseldorf, Germany. lammert@uni-duesseldorf.de
authors.forename: Eckhard
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Lammert
authors.forename: Jennifer
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Axnick
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001808:Blood Vessels / Q000033:anatomy & histology / Q000196:embryology* / Q000502:physiology; D042783:Endothelial Cells / Q000166:cytology* / Q000378:metabolism*; D004730:Endothelium, Vascular / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D007448:Invertebrates / Q000502:physiology; D009369:Neoplasms / Q000098:blood supply; D009389:Neovascularization, Pathologic / Q000503:physiopathology; D018919:Neovascularization, Physiologic / Q000502:physiology; D015398:Signal Transduction; D014714:Vertebrates / Q000502:physiology