Response of xenografts of developing human female reproductive tracts to the synthetic estrogen, diethylstilbestrol.

Response of xenografts of developing human female reproductive tracts to the synthetic estrogen, diethylstilbestrol.
Differentiation. 2017 Oct 04;98:35-54
Authors: Cunha GR, Kurita T, Cao M, Shen J, Robboy SJ, Baskin L
Abstract
Human female fetal reproductive tracts 9.5-22 weeks of gestation were grown for 1 month in ovariectomized athymic adult female mouse hosts that were either untreated or treated continuously with diethylstilbestrol (DES) via subcutaneous pellet. Normal morphogenesis and normal patterns of differentiation marker expression (KRT6, KRT7, KRT8, KRT10, KRT14, KRT19, ESR1, PGR, TP63, RUNX1, ISL1, HOXA11 and α-ACT2) were observed in xenografts grown in untreated hosts and mimicked observations of previously reported (Cunha et al., 2017) non-grafted specimens of comparable age. DES elicited several notable morphological affects: (a) induction of endometrial/cervical glands, (b) increased plication (folding) of tubal epithelium, (c) stratified squamous maturation of vaginal epithelium and (d) vaginal adenosis. DES also induced ESR1 in epithelia of the uterine corpus, cervix and globally induced PGR in most cells of the developing human female reproductive tract. Keratin expression (KRT6, KRT7, KRT8, KRT14 and KRT19) was minimally affected by DES. Simple columnar adenotic epithelium was devoid of TP63 and RUNX1, while DES-induced mature vaginal epithelium was positive for both transcription factors. Another striking eff...

Source: Differentiation - October 4, 2017 Category: Research Authors: Cunha GR, Kurita T, Cao M, Shen J, Robboy SJ, Baskin L Tags: Differentiation Source Type: research