Prokineticin 1 (PROK1), a hypoxia-regulated angiogenic factor, has emerged as a crucial regulator of embryo implantation and placentation. Dysregulation of PROK1 has been linked to recurrent pregnancy loss, pre-eclampsia, foetal growth restriction and preterm birth. These pregnancy complications are common in women with obesity and polycystic ovary syndrome, i.e. conditions associated with insu...

Background: The aim of this study was to investigate the percentage of the stem cells population in human endometrial tissue sections and cultured cells at fourth passage. Methods: Human endometrial specimens were divided into two parts, one part for morphological studies and the other part for in vitro culture. Full thickness of human normal endometrial sections and cultured endometrial cells ...

Endometrial stromal tumor is an uncommon uterine tumor comprising <10% of all uterine mesenchymal neoplasms. The diagnosis of low-grade endometrial stromal sarcoma (LGESS) is based on characteristic histopathological features showing diffuse growth of uniform stromal cells resembling those of proliferative phase endometrium and uniformly distributed small spiral arterioles and it is not problem...

This report describes a uterine tumour exhibiting areas of both endometrial stromal and smooth muscle diVerentiation. There was extensive intravasular permeation within the myometrium as well as extrauterine vascular involvement. The endometrial stromal component had a myxoid appearance and the smooth muscle component exhibited the typical features of intravenous leiomyomatosis. An additional f...

The objective of the present study was to investigate the effects of insulin-like growth factor-binding protein-1 (IGFBP-1) on the interaction between mouse embryos and endometrial stromal cells in co-culture systems. To explore quantitatively the changes in expression of IGFBP-1 mRNA from endometrial stromal cells cultured alone or co-cultured with embryos, a combination of reverse transcripti...

Corticotropin-releasing hormone (CRH) is a hypothalamic neuropeptide that has been identified also in several peripheral tissues, including organs of the reproductive system. In man, CRH is synthesized and released by the gonads, the placenta, maternal decidua, and the epithelial endometrium. So far, CRH has been demonstrated in endometrial stromal cells only after decidualization. The aim of t...

Cancer invasion is an outcome of interactions of the cancer and the host cell. It is now becoming increasingly clear that ovarian hormones have a huge influence on such intercommunications in various types of cancers. Estrogen is known to aggravate the aggressiveness of the endometrial cancer whereas progesterone seems to act as a negative factor. Insight into the mode of ovarian hormonal actio...

BACKGROUND The human endometrium undergoes cyclical regeneration throughout a woman's reproductive life. Ectopic implantation of endometrial cells through retrograde menstruation gives rise to endometriotic lesions which affect approximately 10% of reproductive-aged women. The high regenerative capacity of the human endometrium at eutopic and ectopic sites suggests the existence of stem/progeni...

Proliferation of endometrium is dependent on sex steroid hormones, but specific growth factors are likely to play an important role in regulating this process. A number of cytokines and growth factors are synthesized in the endometrium in response to sex steroid hormones and act to regulate endometrial function. Endometrial cells produce interleukin-8 (IL-8) both in vivo and in vitro. We hypoth...