Physiological Insights Into the Role of Pericytes in Spinal Cord Injury

Haiming Jin; Jessica Rawlins; Yiqi Chen; Xiaohang Zheng; Oscar Charlesworth; Junchun Chen; Gang Wang; Huoling Luo; Wenxiang Cheng; Zhong Alan Li; Sipin Zhu; Jiake Xu

doi:10.1002/jcp.31500

Physiological Insights Into the Role of Pericytes in Spinal Cord Injury

J Cell Physiol. 2025 Jan;240(1):e31500. doi: 10.1002/jcp.31500.

Authors

Haiming Jin^{1

2}, Jessica Rawlins², Yiqi Chen¹, Xiaohang Zheng¹, Oscar Charlesworth², Junchun Chen³, Gang Wang³, Huoling Luo³, Wenxiang Cheng³, Zhong Alan Li⁴, Sipin Zhu^{1

2}, Jiake Xu^{1

2

3}

Affiliations

¹ Department of Orthopaedics, The Second Affiliated Hospital and Yuying Children's Hospital of Wenzhou Medical University, Wenzhou, Zhejiang, China.
² School of Biomedical Sciences, The University of Western Australia, Perth, Western Australia, Australia.
³ Shenzhen Institute of Advanced Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenzhen, China.
⁴ Department of Biomedical Engineering, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, NT, Hong Kong SAR, P. R. China.

Abstract

Vascular regeneration plays a vital role in tissue repair yet is drastically impaired in those with a spinal cord injury (SCI). Pericytes are of great significance as they are entwined with vessel-specific endothelial cells and actively contribute to maintaining the spinal cord's vascular network. Within the neurovascular unit (NVU), subtypes of pericytes characterized by various markers such as PDGFR-β, Desmin, CD146, and NG-2 are involved in vascular regeneration in SCI repair. Various pericyte signaling, pericyte-derived exosomes, and endothelial-pericyte interplay were revealed to participate in SCI repair or fibrotic scars. Through further understanding pericyte biology, it is aimed to accurately generate subtypes of pericytes and develop their therapeutic potential. This review focuses on recent advanced research and development of pericytes as a potential treatment for SCI.

Keywords: pericyte; physiology; spinal cord injury.

Publication types

Review

MeSH terms

Animals
Endothelial Cells / metabolism
Endothelial Cells / pathology
Exosomes / metabolism
Humans
Neovascularization, Physiologic
Pericytes* / metabolism
Pericytes* / pathology
Signal Transduction
Spinal Cord / metabolism
Spinal Cord / pathology
Spinal Cord Injuries* / metabolism
Spinal Cord Injuries* / pathology
Spinal Cord Injuries* / physiopathology

Grants and funding

This study was partly funded by grants from the National Natural Science Funding of China (82172424, 82372396, 82350710800, 82374470, 82202757), Shenzhen Medical Research Fund B2302005), Outstanding Youth Fund of Zhejiang Province (LR22H060002), Zhejiang Medical and Health Science and Technology Plan Project (2022RC210, 2021KY212), and Wenzhou Major Science and Technology Innovation Project Approval Project (ZY2022007).