Hematopoietic growth factors and tumor angiogenesis

Angiogenesis is regulated by numerous "classic" factors such as vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) and many other endogenous "non-classic"peptides, including erythropoietin (Epo), and granulocyte-/granulocyte macrophage colony stimulating factor (G-/GM-CSF). The latter play an important regulatory role in angiogenesis, especially under pathological conditions and constitute a crosslink between angiogenesis and hematopoiesis. This article reviews studies on the ability of hematopoietic cytokines to affect several endothelial cell functions in tumor angiogenesis. These findings in all these studies support the hypothesis formulated at the beginning of this century that a common ancestral cell, the hemangioblast, gives rise to cells of both the endothelial and the hematopoietic lineages.