Lymph Contract Holders

To keep your tissues in tip-top shape, anything that could harm them – from damaged cells to bacteria and viruses – needs to be removed. That’s where lymph comes in. This fluid collects waste products and harmful agents from tissues and transports them to lymph nodes for filtering. Lymph travels through collecting lymphatic vessels (cLVs) which contract to pump the fluid around the body. But where does this contraction-coordinating beat come from? To find cLVs’ so-called 'pacemaker' cells researchers used genetic engineering to fluorescently tag protein markers of different cell types in mouse cLVs (pictured). The shapes, gene expression and electrical activity of these cell types were then investigated to identify the pacemakers. It turns out the lymphatic muscle cells (green, bottom) running along the wall of the vessels are responsible.

Written by Lux Fatimathas

Lux Fatimathas

Writer

Having pursued science through a career in research, communications and publishing, she is currently a writer and editor for a healthcare marketing agency and also juggles freelance science writing.

• Image from work by Scott D Zawieja and colleagues
• Department of Medical Pharmacology & Physiology, University of Missouri, Columbia, MO, USA
• Image originally published with a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
• Published in eLife, September 2025