Talk:Pericyte

Comment
Why doesn't the article say that are are contractible? (which is probably the most important function of those pericytes around capillaries). The article only says that they express actin... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.132.121.246 (talk) 10:11, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

Page Editing
This page is being worked on over the next couple of weeks (November 1, 2011 to December 1, 2011) for a Neuroscience Wikipedia improvement project for the class BI481 at Boston College. The group members are Michael O'Neill, Stephanie Lee, Christopher Lewis, and Jenny Choi. Our main class page can be found at here. Any comments or input on how we can improve our page would be very helpful! Mistamoneill (talk) 04:48, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Non-peer review
Hey guys, the article looks really great. In addition to the comments below, I only have a suggestion about formatting--I'm not sure why your paragraphs have double spaces between them, but they should only be separated by one space. Otherwise, this is very well-written and well-researched. Let me know if you have any other questions before the due date. 136.167.123.243 (talk) 22:12, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

Hey, thanks for finding the formatting error. I have fixed it so that it is single spaced. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Leeafe (talk • contribs) 20:23, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

Hey. Thanks for noticing this. I'll be on the lookout for any other formatting errors. LewisCS13 (talk) 04:32, 8 December 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by LewisCS13 (talk • contribs) 23:09, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Peer Review
Hey guys, I enjoyed reading your article. It is well written and includes a lot of information. I particularly like how you explained the significance of the cells in relation to different facets of the brain and its effects in neurological and neurodegenerative diseases. I would recommend proofreading your article again as there are a few grammatical errors here and there. In terms of the content of your article, here are some questions that were generated on my part:

1) You describe how pericyte functionality and disfunctionality is thought to contribute to many neurodegenerative disorders. It seems that pericyte elasticity is beneficial because it can expand to reduce inflammation and allows harmful substances to diffuse out of the brain. Are there any mechanisms researched as to how this change in pericytes occurs? That could be a valuable addition to your paper.

2) Why is it crucial for pericytes to remain homogenous with their environment?

3) You discuss the role of the Bcl-w protein during cellular crosstalk and how it is important in the pathway that enforces VEGF-A expression, which discourages apoptosis. How does this specifically discourage apoptosis?

4) Expansion on how and why pancreatic pericytes lead to muscle regeneration.

5) You article includes a discussion on the formation of the BBB by pericytes as it inhibits effects of CNS immune cells and reducing expression of molecules that increase vascular permeability. Can you provide more information on this process?

6) Discuss the effects of toxic sorbitol and glycation end products in diabetic retinopathy on pericytes and how their accumulation can lead to problems. Robocop8908 (talk) 19:48, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

-Hey. Thanks for reviewing the article and picking up on the grammatical mistakes. As far as your questions, I reviewed article pertaining the question two and it didn't in fact provide a reason of why it is crucial. It did however say that they have the ability to remain homogeneous in various tissues so I edited the article only to state such. Thanks again for your help. LewisCS13 (talk) 04:32, 8 December 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by LewisCS13 (talk • contribs) 22:22, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for suggestion number 6. I hyperlinked more terms in this section and expanded it, so hopefully it's more clear. --Choino (talk) 23:26, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Peer Review
Hey guys, one key thing that I noticed in your article is the fact that it lacks a lot of internal links. Someone has already written this on the editing page but I think you can definitely link Alzheimers and ALS internally. Also, if you could find a few more pictures to add to your page I think it would make it more interesting. One thing I learned from your page is the fact that pericytes have phagocytic capabilities. I also thought I read somewhere that pericytes are critical to AIDS contraction in the brain. If you find anything on that it might be interesting to add. Great job guys. A lot of good content. I hope these suggestions are use ful (Tilearci (talk) 14:58, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

-Hey. Thanks for reading our article thoroughly and giving us some points which may offer improvement. I have added extensively added Wikilinks to several of the paragraphs under the "Functions" heading. Also, I'm glad that you found the article insightful and were able to to learn some new facts about pericytes. Such is not only a great compliment but also offers a positive outlook for the page. Thanks again for all your help. LewisCS13 (talk) 04:33, 8 December 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by LewisCS13 (talk • contribs) 22:27, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Peer Review
I thought of a few details while going through the article that could improve it. First, the function section could use more internal links. It doesn’t have any at all but many topics that are mentioned (for example, transcytosis, Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, and ALS) have pages on Wikipedia that could help clarify what is being said in the article.

In the last paragraph of the Blood Brain Barrier, the statement about the study of pericyte-deficient mice should have a reference to make it more credible.

One more minor detail, in Angiogenesis and the Survival of Endothelial Cells, “endothelial cells” is unnecessarily capitalized in the first sentence. Overall, good job expanding the article. Mdac927 (talk) 21:26, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

-Hey. Thanks for picking up on a few errors in the "functions" section. Links were added and the unnecessary capitalization of "endothelial cells" was corrected. As far as the study involving mice, it had come from the same source as the the information contained in the several lines following it. Therefore, it is included in source 7. Thanks again for your help. LewisCS13 (talk) 04:33, 8 December 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by LewisCS13 (talk • contribs) 22:30, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Peer Review
Hey guys, This article was expanded very well and contains a great wealth of information. I found it especially informative how you used the connection between endothelial cells and pericytes as a detailed point of reference and connectivity, because it enables the reader to draw connections to a concept that is already familiar. I know this has been said already but the sections about function has quite a few terms that could be wikilinked, and also some specific lines are not referenced. We were told by other wikipedia users editing our page to reference every single point where we used outside information(which is most of the lines in the paper). Just a few suggestions for an overall awesome and informative article! (Adondaki (talk) 15:22, 15 November 2011 (UTC))

-Hey. Thanks for reading our article thoroughly and thoughtfully. I just completed adding several links to the "functions" section. As far as references, each article or paper cited contained several lines of information which were used throughout the paper. This information was grouped together however so that they all can be found in a given source after such a grouping. Therefore, more citations after each line could be beneficial however I am reluctant to for the sake of the article's citations appearing too redundant for the common reader. Thanks again. LewisCS13 (talk) 04:34, 8 December 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by LewisCS13 (talk • contribs) 22:37, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Peer Review
Excellent job on this article! After reading it, I found that there were very few things you guys need to actually change.

The second sentence of the second paragraph under "Blood Brain Barrier" could be worded a little more precisely. Instead of saying "they are contractile cells so they can open or close a given amount to allow or (disallow) certain sized particles to flow through the vessel," it could be reworded to "As contractile cells, pericytes can open or close a given amount to allow (or disallow) certain sized particles to flow through the vessel." Additionally, I think this section would benefit from an image of the blood brain barrier so that readers that do not know what it is can visualize it.

In "Angiogenesis and the Survival of Endothelial Cells," the term "angiogenesis" is not mentioned. This section would benefit from mentioning the term within the text and linking it to the wiki page on angiogenesis, for readers that are unfamiliar with the term.

Again, great job and good luck with the rest of the project!

Marcetk (talk) 15:35, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

Hey. Thanks for picking up on this. That sentence was worded quite confusingly so I correct it (along with a few others). As far as the angiogenesis part, early on in the paragraph I spoke about vesicular branching which constituted angiogenesis. I was sure to include a wikilink using the word to the angiogenesis page after speaking of such however so that the reader can more easily make the connection. Thanks again. LewisCS13 (talk) 04:34, 8 December 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by LewisCS13 (talk • contribs) 22:40, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Peer Review
I really liked the organization of this article. In most of the sections you had a ton of links, but in the Functions section there were not any. If you linked to some more articles it would make a much more comprehensive section. In addition, I noticed a few typos in the functions section that other students have picked up on as well. I would recommend reading the section once or twice to make sure that there aren't any when the final page is due. For example when you say the "effects or brain aging" I think you meant to say the "effects on brain aging". In addition, your explanation of transcytosis is a little unclear and could be worded better!

I also thought that you could include a few more pictures/figures so that the reader can get a more complete picture of what you are talking about. The main picture is very interesting, but the description could be a little more in depth.

Other than that you did a great job expanding the article. Good luck with the rest of your project! Allison (talk) 12:20, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

-Hey. Thank you for reading the article and picking up on this. I added links to the functions section, corrected this spelling error and proofread the section for any further spelling/grammatical errors. Thanks again. LewisCS13 (talk) 04:35, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

- Thanks for the suggestions, I've been looking through the wikimedia pages to find appropriate images to include on our page. So far the search has yielded few results for pericytes as well as the blood-brain barrier, but we have found a few other images to help illustrate our information and make the page more visually pleasing. Mistamoneill (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 00:01, 8 December 2011 (UTC).

Peer Review
Great job on the article! Definitely thought you guys did a great job organizing the article starting with morphology and moving on down ending with research. One quick point, I'd recommned adding wiki-links in the "Function" section. It goes into great detail, which is awesome, but it's hard to keep track of all the different enzymes listed. If you guys could somehow add links to just a few of these I know it would let readers gain a better understand the function of pericytes. If you guys model it after the wiki-links in the "Endothelial and Pericyte Interactions" section you guys would be good to go. I loved the picture in the beginning as it helps the readers gain a better sense of what a pericyte actually is. All in all I loved the structure and order of the article, good luck on the final draft! Heyjorge102 (talk) 03:41, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

-Hey. Thanks for reading the article and for the positive feedback. I just added links to the "functions" section. As far as enzymes and various other proteins however, there appears to be only a few that actually have wikipedia articles dedicated to them (such as VEGF and B-cl2. I therefore included links to these pages. Thanks again. LewisCS13 (talk) 04:35, 8 December 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by LewisCS13 (talk • contribs) 22:46, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Peer Review
To reiterate what has already been said in a few reviews- great job structuring the article! I found the sections very easy to follow and especially thought that the introduction set up a good summary of what was explained following in further detail and depth. One small suggestion I would offer in the intro is to expand the first sentence so as to help inform the reader a little bit more of where a pericyte is actually located and what its overall characterization is beyond "a type of cell found in the central nervous system." Perhaps you could say something like "A pericyte is a cell found in the CNS which wraps around the epithelial cells of the capillary walls." I know you articulate this is your Morphology section, but I think it would also be good to just include a little more information in your initial definition of a pericyte.

I especially thought that the Pathologies section was very well written and succinct in its overview of pericyte function and its associated diseases.

One last suggestion I would make is to read over the Research section. The first line where you say that 'researchers have been able to extract pancreatic pericytes and injected them into injured muscles...' you could maybe explain why they did that, what they thought they would be able to study, etc. Also, where you talk about Endothelial and pericyte interactions I think you could add a few examples of human pathologies that could be linked to an insufficient communication between the two types of cells, especially if they are different from the pathologies you wrote about. Also, I'm confused as to why you used the term "mural cells" especially because the wiki link is just a stub and seems to say that mural cells are simply "pericytes," so it might be more consistent to just stick with using that term, unless you want to explain a bit more clearly what mural cells are (if they are in fact different from pericytes).

Overall I really enjoyed reading the article and learned a lot more about pericytes than we touched on in class. Well done! Michjkelley (talk) 04:57, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

- Thank you very much for your comments. I reviewed the introduction of the article and decided to incorporate your suggestion by adding additional information about the specific location of pericytes after the first sentence. I thought it was important to gradually increase the specificity of information in the wiki article to make as understandable as possible to readers and I also recognized the importance of clearly elaborating on pericyte location in the introduction.Mistamoneill (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 19:49, 7 December 2011 (UTC).

Hey. Thanks for reading our article. The functions section was expanded slightly to further aid in the discussion under the pathology part. LewisCS13 (talk) 04:36, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

-Hey, thanks for your comment. The first line of the Research section was actually there before I started editing the page and didn't know if I was allowed to delete it. It has been deleted for less confusion. Also, mural cells are not directly pericytes but include vascular smooth muscle cells as well. The reason why I put that was because endothelial cells not only interact with pericytes but the broader category of mural cells. However, since the section is Endothelial/Pericyte interaction, I see where you were confused. I have changed it to pericytes so that it is less confusing. Also, the pathologies overlap with our Pathology section, so I didn't include specifics, but I did refer it back to the Pathology section. Thanks again. - Leeafe — Preceding unsigned comment added by Leeafe (talk • contribs) 00:10, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

Peer Review
This was a very informative wikipedia page. I felt most of the topics were covered that a wikipedia reader would want to know. The language is very accessible to the general population and someone without a neuroscience background could understand what was going on. The order of the wikipedia page was very smooth as well. The main issues with this page relate to wikipedia editing. Having a general encyclopedia topic that is very complicated means that a lot of the terminology will not be understood fully. This means that any words that can somewhat nonconventional must be hyperlinked. Also try to include pictures of pericytes that are going these specific diseases and how they change. If you guys want to add more information, you could talk about development of pericytes from birth. Great work. mrfushiman (talk) 02:23, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Hey. Thanks for the suggestions. I just added some wiki-links to the functions section to help further expand the reader's knowledge.LewisCS13 (talk) 04:36, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

Peer Review
First of all, I would like to say that your article is very much written like a professional. The style of writing seemed to incorporate richness and detail into most aspects of each subtopic. Your article was very well organized with no irrelevant subcategories. A few flaws to your article would be a lack of attraction. I would suggest adding more images to your article as it shows that you only have the main one of a pericyte at the top of the article. Maybe add in an image to the “Pathologies” section of your article, as it is always interesting to see biological process at the microscopic level. Another suggestion would be to add in more links under the “Function” heading in your article, as there are little to none.

Small nit picky things should also be changed like writing out “Alzheimer’s Disease, Parkinson’s Disease, and Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis” instead of “Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, and ALS.” Every sentence in your article should be grammatically parallel, which adds to the ease of sentence flow. You should subsequently make links to the latter as well. Also, under the “Pathologies” heading in your article, you talk about how “when signaling is disrupted, pericytes, undergo apoptosis, leading to many neurodegenerative diseases including Alzheimer’s disease, and Multiple Sclerosis.” It would be interesting and helpful if you could explain a little about how each disease is caused (not too much detail, just an overview!). Maybe describe how the signaling may be disrupted and the different stages pericytes go through before cell death. Finally, you should add in abbreviations to articles that can be abbreviated such as Parkinson’s Disease (PD) and Multiple Sclerosis (MS). Matthomas118 (talk) 08:07, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Hey. Thanks for the critiques. I added links to the functions section and altered the "Alzheimer's Disease, Parkinson's Disease, and ALS" sentence by including Lou Gehrig's disease after ALS hyperlinked in parenthesis. My only qualm about writing out Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis would be it seems the nomenclature is a bit uncommon for use in the general population. Whenever I've heard of someone talk about the disease in common speech, it was always referred to as Lou Gehrig's disease or ALS. I therefore kept it at such because I wanted to be sure the general reader would make that connection. Thank you again for the insight. LewisCS13 (talk) 04:37, 8 December 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by LewisCS13 (talk • contribs) 23:05, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for your suggestion of putting images under pathologies. I put in an image of a hemangiopericytoma next to the paragraph. --Choino (talk) 23:09, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Peer Review
Great job so far! I found your article really informative and well organized. I think you did a good job of going into detail without being overly esoteric. I do have a few suggestions, in addition to what has already been mentioned by other peer reviews. First, I think the general writing in the "Morphology" section would benefit from making some syntactical improvements that would help to refine flow; for example, you could add some transitional phrases that link ideas and make reading smoother. I thought the "Function" section was very well-done, in particular--just be sure to fix any grammatical errors, e.g. specious capitalization of "endothelial cells" and a missing "of" in the sentence "Pericytes are also associated with the allowing Endothelial Cells to differentiate, multiply, form vascular branches, survive apoptotic symbols and travel throughout the body." Finally, I think the "Research" section should be renamed to more specifically describe this portion of the article. Perhaps "Research involving pericytes," "Roles in Research," or even "Current Research" might suffice. Overall, though, I really enjoyed this article! Keep up the good work. Jinhl (talk) 02:57, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

- Thanks for your comment. I have changed the Research title to better portray its contents in the context of the whole page. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Leeafe (talk • contribs) 20:35, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

- Thank you for your suggestions, I reviewed the "Morphology" section and edited and expanded certain sections to improve the readability and flow of the section. Mistamoneill (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 19:32, 7 December 2011 (UTC).

Hey. Thanks for reading the article and for your critiques. I just finished editing the spelling/grammatical errors in the "Functions" section. Thanks again. LewisCS13 (talk) 04:38, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

Pericytes are not found only in the CNS
Pericytes are not confined to the CNS, so it's not clear why this article seems to suggest that they are.

For example, in reference to tumors throughout the body, Pietras writes, "Pericytes are contractile cells in close physical contact with endothelial cells in capillaries and venules (Fig. 1)." http://people.musc.edu/~rosenzsa/LaRue/Pietras_Review_2010.pdf

I'm inclined to correct this apparent error, at least in the opening summary. Any objections?


 * Later. After nosing around, it looks like this article was a group project for a neuroscience class at Boston College in 2011. I'm going to assume that nobody is coming back to respond to me and go ahead and correct this one error. I'm not in position to fact check the rest of the article, but I hope that the professor, Joe Burdo, has otherwise taken responsibility for that.

Eperotao (talk) 21:34, 1 January 2013 (UTC)

I have edited the summary only, making it more clear that pericytes have other names and are not confined to the CNS. I also streamlined what I thought was a slightly verbose academic style, so that a user looking for a quick definition will get the idea. I have not touched the rest of the article.

Eperotao (talk) 22:11, 1 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Thanks for that correction NeuroJoe (talk) 15:14, 2 January 2013 (UTC)

Assessment comment
Substituted at 02:38, 30 April 2016 (UTC)