title: Pericytes: A newly recognized player in wound healing.
abstract: Pericytes have generally been considered in the context of stabilizing vessels, ensuring the blood barriers, and regulating the flow through capillaries. However, new reports suggest that pericytes may function at critical times to either drive healing with minimal scarring or, perversely, contribute to fibrosis and ongoing scar formation. Beneficially, pericytes probably drive much of the vascular involution that occurs during the transition from the regenerative to the resolution phases of healing. Pathologically, pericytes can assume a fibrotic phenotype and promote scarring. This perspective will discuss pericyte involvement in wound repair and the relationship pericytes form with the parenchymal cells of the skin. We will further evaluate the role pericytes may have in disease progression in relation to chronic wounds and fibrosis.
authors.affiliation: Department of Pathology, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.|McGowan Institute for Regenerative Medicine, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.|Veterans Affairs Medical Center, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
authors.forename: Richard J
authors.initials: RJ
authors.lastname: Bodnar
authors.affiliation: McGowan Institute for Regenerative Medicine, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.|Department of Plastic Surgery, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
authors.forename: Latha
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Satish
authors.affiliation: Department of Pathology, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.|McGowan Institute for Regenerative Medicine, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.|Veterans Affairs Medical Center, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.|Department of Health Promotions and Development, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
authors.forename: Cecelia C
authors.initials: CC
authors.lastname: Yates
authors.affiliation: Department of Pathology, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.|McGowan Institute for Regenerative Medicine, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.|Veterans Affairs Medical Center, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
authors.forename: Alan
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Wells
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D002908:Chronic Disease / Q000628:therapy; D002921:Cicatrix / Q000517:prevention & control; D019317:Evidence-Based Medicine; D005355:Fibrosis / Q000473:pathology / Q000628:therapy; D006801:Humans; D020286:Pericytes / Q000166:cytology / Q000502:physiology*; D044968:Regenerative Medicine / Q000639:trends; D012867:Skin / Q000473:pathology; D014945:Wound Healing / Q000502:physiology*; D014947:Wounds and Injuries / Q000473:pathology / Q000628:therapy