Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Editorial
. 2025 Apr 10:14:e106689.
doi: 10.7554/eLife.106689.

When cell teamwork turns toxic

Affiliations
Editorial

When cell teamwork turns toxic

Wadih E I Khoury et al. Elife. .

Abstract

In pulmonary hypertension, a combination of metabolic and mechanical dysfunction leads to irreversible vascular damage.

Keywords: adventitial fibroblasts; cell biology; human; medicine; pulmonary artery; pulmonary hypertension; vascular smooth muscle cells.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

WK No competing interests declared, SC Consultant for Merck, Janssen, and United Therapeutics; director, officer, and shareholder in Synhale Therapeutics; has held grants from Bayer and United Therapeutics; has filed patent applications regarding metabolism and next-generation therapeutics in pulmonary hypertension (US 10,925,869 B2; PCT/US2015/029286; PCT/US2018/062013; US 11,773,391 B2; PCT/IB2023/055431)

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.. Progression from healthy pulmonary artery adventitial fibroblasts (PAAFs) and pulmonary artery smooth muscle cells (PASMCs) to pulmonary hypertension (PH) phenotype.
In healthy arteries (left), PASMCs are dynamic cells that regulate flow and pressure in the lung vasculature by contracting and dilating, while the fibroblasts on the vessel’s outer layer (PAAFs) protect PASMCs (green triangles). In pulmonary hypertension, PAAFs overproduce collagen and harmful proteins (red triangles) that cause PASMCs to become rigid. Imbalanced protein dynamics and mitochondrial dysfunction in both cell types further contribute to the diseased state (right). Created with BioRender.com.

Comment on

  • doi: 10.7554/eLife.98558

References

    1. Chan SY, Zhang YY, Hemann C, Mahoney CE, Zweier JL, Loscalzo J. MicroRNA-210 controls mitochondrial metabolism during hypoxia by repressing the iron-sulfur cluster assembly proteins ISCU1/2. Cell Metabolism. 2009;10:273–284. doi: 10.1016/j.cmet.2009.08.015. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Crnkovic S, Valzano F, Fließer E, Gindlhuber J, Thekkekara Puthenparampil H, Basil M, Morley MP, Katzen J, Gschwandtner E, Klepetko W, Cantu E, Wolinski H, Olschewski H, Lindenmann J, Zhao YY, Morrisey EE, Marsh LM, Kwapiszewska G. Single-cell transcriptomics reveals skewed cellular communication and phenotypic shift in pulmonary artery remodeling. JCI Insight. 2022;7:20. doi: 10.1172/jci.insight.153471. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Crnkovic S, Puthenparampil HT, Mulch S, Biasin V, Radic N, Wilhelm J, Bartkuhn M, Rad EB, Wawrzen A, Matzer I, Mitra A, Leib R, Nagy BM, Sahu-Osen A, Valzano F, Bordag N, Evermann M, Hoetzenecker K, Olschewski A, Ljubojevic-Holzer S, Wygrecka M, Stenmark K, Marsh LM, de Jesus Perez V, Kwapiszewska G. Adventitial fibroblasts direct smooth muscle cell-state transition in pulmonary vascular disease. eLife. 2025;13:RP98558. doi: 10.7554/eLife.98558. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. El Kasmi KC, Pugliese SC, Riddle SR, Poth JM, Anderson AL, Frid MG, Li M, Pullamsetti SS, Savai R, Nagel MA, Fini MA, Graham BB, Tuder RM, Friedman JE, Eltzschig HK, Sokol RJ, Stenmark KR. Adventitial fibroblasts induce a distinct proinflammatory/profibrotic macrophage phenotype in pulmonary hypertension. Journal of Immunology. 2014;193:597–609. doi: 10.4049/jimmunol.1303048. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Frid MG, McKeon BA, Thurman JM, Maron BA, Li M, Zhang H, Kumar S, Sullivan T, Laskowsky J, Fini MA, Hu S, Tuder RM, Gandjeva A, Wilkins MR, Rhodes CJ, Ghataorhe P, Leopold JA, Wang RS, Holers VM, Stenmark KR. Immunoglobulin-driven complement activation regulates proinflammatory remodeling in pulmonary hypertension. American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine. 2020;201:224–239. doi: 10.1164/rccm.201903-0591OC. - DOI - PMC - PubMed

Publication types