Galectin-1 plays a pivotal role in endometriosis by promoting the vascular network development in endometriotic lesions

BASTON JI; BARAÑAO RI; RICCI A; OLIVARES C; RABINOVICH G; MERESMAN G

San Pablo

Congreso; 12th World Endometriosis Congress; 2014

World Endometriosis Society

Objective: Galectin-1 (Gal-1) is an endogenous lectin that plays an essential role as immunomodulatory and proangiogenic factor in cancer. However it has not been reported the involvement of Gal-1 in endometriosis pathophysiology. Thus, our main goal was to study the role of Gal-1 in growth and vascular development of endometriotic lesions. Design (50 words): Endometriotic lesions were surgically induced by autologous transplantation of endometrial tissue to bowel mesentery of wild-type or Gal-1 knock-out mice for WT and KO groups respectively, by heterologous transplantation of endometrial tissue from Gal-1 knock-out to bowel mesentery of wild-type mice for hWT group, and the opposite for hKO group. Material and methods: The number and size of endometriotic lesions were evaluated in WT, KO, hWT and hKO groups in the post-surgical day 28. Gal-1 expression and the relative vascularized area were assessed by immunohistochemistry in lesions and the concentrations of proangiogenic factors were measured in peritoneal fluid by ELISA, in all groups. Results: The histological expression of Gal-1 was restricted to stromal compartment of the endometriotic lesions. The number of developed lesions decreased only in KO mice compared to WT and hKO (P=0.001). However, the lesions size was significantly reduced in KO, hWT and hKO compared to WT, by 72.6%, 78.3% and 59.7% respectively (P