Journal
JOURNAL OF HISTOCHEMISTRY & CYTOCHEMISTRY
Volume 69, Issue 12, Pages 795-818Publisher
SAGE PUBLICATIONS LTD
DOI: 10.1369/00221554211025489
Keywords
intestine; skeletal muscle; stem cell niches; stemness; stromal cells; telocytes; tissue microenvironment
Categories
Funding
- MIUR (Ministry of Education, University and Research, Italy)-University of Florence
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Telocytes are newly identified interstitial cells with thin and long cytoplasmic processes called telopodes. They are considered supporting cells that help in maintaining tissue homeostasis and contribute to tissue renewal and repair by communicating with neighboring cells and possibly regulating the activity of tissue-resident stem cells.
Telocytes (TCs) are newly identified interstitial cells characterized by thin and long cytoplasmic processes, called telopodes, which exhibit a distinctive moniliform shape and, often, a sinuous trajectory. Telopodes typically organize in intricate networks within the stromal space of most organs, where they communicate with neighboring cells by means of specialized cell-to-cell junctions or shedding extracellular vesicles. Hence, TCs are generally regarded as supporting cells that help in the maintenance of local tissue homeostasis, with an ever-increasing number of studies trying to explore their functions both in physiological and pathological conditions. Notably, TCs appear to be part of stem cell (SC) niches in different organs, including the intestine, skeletal muscle, heart, lung, and skin. Indeed, growing evidence points toward a possible implication of TCs in the regulation of the activity of tissue-resident SCs and in shaping the SC niche microenvironment, thus contributing to tissue renewal and repair. Here, we review how the introduction of TCs into the scientific literature has deepened our knowledge of the stromal architecture focusing on the intestine and skeletal muscle, two organs in which the recently unveiled unique relationship between TCs and SCs is currently in the spotlight as potential target for tissue regenerative purposes.
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