THE PROSTATE: DEVELOPMENT AND PHYSIOLOGY - 06/09/11
Résumé |
The principal function of the prostate is to provide the proteins and ions that form the bulk of the seminal fluid. The adult human prostate is a tubuloalveolar gland composed of ducts lined with a pseudostratified columnar epithelium. The cells lining the ducts are tall columnar and secretory with basal nuclei. A nearly continuous layer of basal epithelial cells abut the epithelial basement membrane. The prostatic epithelium is, in turn, surrounded by a dense fibromuscular stroma.
Development of the prostate begins with the growth of prostatic buds from the urogenital sinus at about 10 weeks of fetal development in the human.56, 77 Androgen receptors (AR) in the urogenital sinus mesenchyme (UGM) are stimulated by testicular androgens to induce epithelial budding, proliferation, and differentiation to form ductal structures.23 The epithelium differentiates into luminal and basal subtypes and expresses characteristic secretory markers. Concurrent with epithelial differentiation the UGM proliferates and differentiates into prostatic smooth muscle and interfascicular fibroblasts.39, 40, 41 In the mature prostate androgens are believed to act upon prostatic smooth muscle (which expresses AR) to maintain a fully differentiated growth-quiescent epithelium via paracrine stromal–epithelial interactions.25, 84 The role of the epithelial AR is apparently restricted to regulating secretory functions.29 Growth factors are obvious candidates for the mesenchymally produced paracrine androgen-regulated factors (andromedins) that act on the epithelium.
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| Address reprint requests to Simon W. Hayward, PhD, Department of Urology, U-575, University of California, San Francisco, San Francisco, CA 94143–0738, e-mail: simonh@itsa.ucsf.edu |
Vol 38 - N° 1
P. 1-14 - janvier 2000 Retour au numéro
Article précédent
- PREFACE
- HEDVIG HRICAK, PETER R. CARROLL
- RADIOLOGIC ANATOMY OF THE PROSTATE GLAND: A CLINICAL APPROACH
- Fergus V. Coakley, Hedvig Hricak
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