Vessel Engineering

Blood vessels – the tubes that make up our biological 'plumbing' – are essential for carrying oxygen and nutrients around the body, forming their delicate network as we grow in the womb. But in some illnesses, such as cancer or the eye disease diabetic retinopathy, new vessels sprout where they aren't wanted, fuelling tumour growth or causing sight problems. In order to create new blood vessels, two types of cells have to get together and co-operate: endothelial cells and pericytes. To find out more about this process, scientists are cultivating these cells in the lab, using special conditions to engineer the growth of tiny blood vessels, like the ones seen here. Not only is this providing a useful model to figure out how vessels grow in normal development as well as disease, but they're a handy tool for testing drugs that might alter the process, potentially leading to new treatments.

Written by Kat Arney

Kat Arney

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Dr Kat Arney is an award-winning science writer, broadcaster and public speaker, and is the founder and Creative Director of First Create The Media.

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• Image from work by Jaerim Kim and Minhwan Chung, and colleagues
• Seoul National University College of Medicine, Korea
• Originally published under a Creative Commons Licence (BY 4.0)
• Published in PLOS ONE, July 2015