However, compared with control mice, we observed an increased number of fenestrae in the endothelial cells of grafts treated with DOI at 3 hours after transplantation (Fig. 2A-C). This suggests that SECs react to serotonin by opening fenestrae that support fluid

exchange. As observed by scanning electron microscopy, DOI appears to affect SECs; therefore, we asked whether this might have functional consequences on microcirculation and perfusion. We tested graft microcirculation by intravital fluorescence microscopy 1 hour after transplantation. The sinusoidal functional density was 480 ± 27.5 (cm/cm2) in DOI-treated mice, which was significantly higher than in controls (346.72 ± 20.9; P = 0.028) (Fig. 3A). Similarly, the sinusoidal red blood cell velocity was higher in DOI-treated animals compared with controls (0.38 ± 0.03 versus 0.25 ± 0.02; P = 0.003) Small molecule library cell assay (Fig. 3B). Although there was no obvious cellular damage, the architecture of the sinusoidal

click here network in controls appeared disturbed (Fig. 3C) in contrast to DOI-treated animals, which retained an intact sinusoidal architecture (Fig. 3D). We investigated whether serotonin improves survival after 30% OLT. Recipient survival was recorded for 7 days, and is presented as a Kaplan-Meier curve. In the saline-treated control group, all recipients died 2-4 days after surgery. In contrast, application of DOI rescued 50% of the transplanted animals (Fig. 3E) (P = 0.01). We have shown that PTX reverses SFS syndrome after OLT.8 In those experiments, we observed increased transcript levels of anti-inflammatory cytokines, an improvement of liver regeneration and preservation of microcirculation in the graft. We therefore hypothesized that the combination of DOI with PTX may act synergistically to protect the graft from SFS syndrome. To clarify the impact of serotonin together with PTX on survival after SFS transplantation, we developed a new model of partial OLT. Because PTX and serotonin treatment alone already improved

survival in 30% OLT, we reduced the size of the graft to only 25% of the total liver mass. To achieve this volume, each liver lobe except the right lobe was removed during the donor procedure. We treated the 25% OLT donor and recipients MCE公司 with saline, DOI, and DOI plus PTX and compared 7-day survival among the groups. As expected, no animals in the control group survived, but approximately half of the animals in the DOI group survived. To our surprise, combination therapy with DOI plus PTX did not further improve survival compared with DOI alone (Fig. 3F). The lack of additional benefit suggests that the action of serotonin and PTX may share a common pathway. However, we cannot exclude the possibility that toxicity from massive pharmacological interventions may have impeded an improvement of survival by an otherwise beneficial effect of PTX. Furthermore, these results indicate that DOI plays a decisive role in improving the outcome of SFS OLT.