In vitro reproduction and ultrastructural detection of the genesis of calcifying cell-derived structures identical to actual hydroxyapatite nucleators in calcific aortic valve stenosis

Headnote

Keywords: in-vitro calcification model, calcific aortic valve stenosis, ectopic calcification

Unlike fairly good characterization gained for the major hydroxyapatite nucleators involved in physiological mineralization, i.e. matrix vesicles and apoptotic bodies, no details are available about source and genesis of so called "thick walled cell-derivedproducts" (CDPs) and "concentrically laminated calcospherulae" (CLCs), which are primary calcium deposition foci in ectopic calcification, including calcific aortic valve stenosis. Here, generation of these structures was successfully reproduced in vitro using an original model simulating either metastatic or dystrophic calcification, subsequent to differential inorganic phosphate supplementations to primary cultures of...