Linking wound healing and cancer risk

[Joachim]

When our skin is damaged, a whole set of biological processes springs into action to heal the wound. Now, researchers from the VIB-UGent Center for Inflammation Research have shown that one of the molecules involved in this, HMGB1, slows down wound healing. It is, however, also essential for tumor formation at sites of previous injury. The researchers found that HMGB1 controls the actions of neutrophils, a specific type of immune cells, in skin wounds and that this is crucial for cancer initiation. Targeting this pathway could be beneficial in diabetic wound care and in patients suffering from skin blistering diseases. Their work appears in Cell Reports.

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