Circulating Fibroblast Progenitors Contribute to Heart Fibrosis
By: Professor Qingbo Xu
Professor Qingbo Xu is currently a Qiushi Professor and Director of Cardiovascular Research Centre, The First Affiliated Hospital Zhejiang University Medical School. Professor Xu qualified in Medicine at Peking Union Medical College and then the University of Innsbruck, Austria. He was appointed Professor in Cardiovascular Science at St George’s Hospital in 2000 and then to the BHF John Parker Chair of Cardiovascular Sciences at King’s College London in 2006. Professor Xu’s research interesting is in stem/progenitor cells and vascular biology.
It is known that tissue resident fibroblasts are participating in the process of organ fibrosis including cardiac fibrosis during heart failure, but no report showing the presence of fibroblast progenitors in blood contribute to the fibrosis. This presentation will show how fibroblast progenitor cells was discovered, how they are homing to the transplanted heart and how they contribute to cardiac fibrosis.