Endothelial progenitor cell

Endothelial progenitor cells (English: endothelial progenitor cells, EPCs) are circulating in the bloodstream cells derived from the bone marrow. You have the ability to differentiate into endothelial cells, which line blood vessels then on the inside. This process does not arise as an offshoot of an existing vessel in which blood vessels, but de novo, ie vasculogenesis. It runs predominantly during embryonic development. Those endothelial progenitor cells that circulate in adults are, therefore, related to angioblasts, which are the stem cells from which emerge during embryogenesis blood vessels.

EPCs are believed to be part of pathological angiogenesis, as they occur frequently in the case of retinopathy, and tumor growth. While angioblasts have been known for a long time, EPCs were characterized in adults until the 1990s, when Asahara et al. published, that can be a purified population of CD34-positive cells from the blood of adult mice in vitro to differentiate into endothelial cells.

As EPCs derived from the bone marrow, is believed to be released by different cytokines, growth factors and hormones, from there. In the peripheral circulation, they will be attracted to regions in which angiogenesis takes place.