MIGRATION INTO AN INVITRO EXPERIMENTAL WOUND - A COMPARISON OF PORCINE AORTIC ENDOTHELIAL AND SMOOTH-MUSCLE CELLS AND THE EFFECT OF CULTURE IRRADIATION

  • 1 January 1981
    • journal article
    • research article
    • Vol. 103  (2) , 271-282
Abstract
The group cell migration characteristics of endothelial cells (EC) and smooth muscle cells (SMC) derived from the same source, the porcine thoracic aorta, were compared as they moved into an experimental in vitro vascular wound. Migration was characterized by measuring 2 aspects of the migrating cells: the number of free cells in the wound and the distance of migration of the sheet of cells at the wound edge. The quantitative data showed that EC migrated into the wound as a sheet of cells, while SMC migrated as free single cells. Since irradiated cells were used to study cell migration. Since the irradiated cells do undergo some shape changes, the distribution of the cytoskeletal microfilament fibers was compared in migrating irradiated and nonirradiated cells to see whether this feature of cell migration was different. Irradiated and nonirradiated migrating EC showed a strikingly different pattern in the orientation of microfilament bundles when studied by immunofluorescence microscopy with antiserums to myosin and tropomyosin.