Role of the Uteroplacental Renin-Angiotensin System in Placental Development and Function, and Its Implication in the

Lucile Yart1, Edith Roset Bahmanyar2, Marie Cohen1

  • 1Department of Pediatrics, Gynecology and Obstetrics, University Hospitals of Geneva, University of Geneva, 1211 Geneva, Switzerland.

Biomedicines
|October 23, 2021
PubMed

Placental development and function implicate important morphological and physiological adaptations to thereby ensure efficient maternal-fetal exchanges, as well as pregnancy-specific hormone secretion and immune modulation. Incorrect placental development can lead to severe pregnancy disorders, such as preeclampsia (PE), which endangers both the mother and the infant. The implication of the systemic renin-angiotensin system (RAS) in the pregnancy-related physiological changes is now well established. However, despite the fact that the local uteroplacental RAS has been described for several decades, its role in placental development and function seems to have been underestimated. In this review, we provide an overview of the multiple roles of the uteroplacental RAS in several cellular processes of placental development, its implication in the regulation of placental function during pregnancy, and the consequences of its dysregulation in PE pathogenesis.

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