Difference in mRNA expression and occurrence of plasminogen activator inhibitors in intrauterine decidua of normal and ectopic human pregnancies.

The objective of this study was to elucidate the mechanisms involved in the formation of a functional decidua. The concentrations of plasminogen activators and plasminogen activator inhibitors in intrauterine decidua from normal and ectopic pregnancies were compared. Intrauterine decidua was obtained by curettage from 17 women with ectopic pregnancies and from five women with normal pregnancies.

Increasing expression of tissue plasminogen activator and plasminogen activator inhibitor type 2 in dog gingival tissues with progressive inflammation.

Urokinase and tissue-type plasminogen activators (u--PA and t--PA) are serine proteases that convert plasminogen into plasmin, which degrades matrix proteins and activates metalloproteinases. The PAs are balanced by specific inhibitors (PAI--1 and PAI--2). Local production of t--PA and PAI--2 was recently demonstrated in human gingival tissues.

Localization of plasminogen activators and plasminogen-activator inhibitors in human gingival tissues demonstrated by immunohistochemistry and in situ hybridization.

The plasminogen-activating system plays an important part in tissue proteolysis in physiological as well as pathological processes. Plasminogen activators u-PA (urokinase) and t-PA (tissue) as well as the inhibitors PAI-1 and PAI-2 are present in gingival crevicular fluid in concentrations significantly greater than in plasma. This fact, and the finding that the concentrations of t-PA and PAI-2 are higher in areas with gingival inflammation, indicate local production of these components.

Factors of the plasminogen activator system in human testis, as demonstrated by in-situ hybridization and immunohistochemistry.

A growing body of evidence suggests that the plasminogen activator (PA) system is crucially involved in reproductive physiology in both sexes. Certain factors of the PA system have been found to be present in organs of the male reproductive tract in various species, and the presence of several of the factors was recently demonstrated in monkey testis. The present morphological study was therefore designed to investigate the occurrence and distribution of the tissue and urokinase plasminogen activators (t-PA and u-PA), the u-PA receptor (u-PAR) and the plasminogen activator inhibitors (PAI-1 and PAI-2) in normal human testis.

High tissue content of urokinase plasminogen activator (u-PA) is associated with high stromal expression of u-PA mRNA in poorly differentiated serous ovarian carcinoma.

Urokinase plasminogen activator (u-PA) plays a pivotal role in tissue degradation during tumor spread and metastasis. We have quantitated u-PA in tissue homogenates of 31 serous ovarian tumors and localized u-PA and its mRNA in tissue sections of 26 serous ovarian tumors. The content of u-PA was higher in malignant than in benign tumors, with the highest levels being found in poorly differentiated cancers.