[Trend of molecular biological studies on the liver sinusoidal cells--Kupffer cells]

The Kupffer cells are sessile macrophages residing in the hepatic sinusoids. The Kupffer cells are well known as the first line of defence against pathogenic agents derived from not-self substances, in some cases even from self proteins. Indeed, Kupffer cells play an important roles in such a defence system: they act as an antigen presenting cells, and also produce various kinds of cytokines and chemical mediators such as prostaglandins, leukotrienes and platelet activating factor. In this article, we introduce these functions of Kupffer cells and discuss the possible pathway of the signal transduction.