In the second part of the current issue, the origin of myofibroblasts and their role in fibrosis in the repair and remodeling of various tissues, such as heart and liver, will be discussed (Hutchenreuther and Leask 2016 Talman and Ruskoaho 2016 Lemoinne et al.
A recent publication has presented additional evidence, from multiple fibrosis models, supporting the idea that αSMA is an inconsistent marker for fibrotic cells (K.H. A recent careful study tracing the fibroblast lineage has revealed that only 15% of the fibrotic fibroblasts are αSMA-positive in a heart fibrosis model (Moore-Morris et al.
2002), a definition that now appears to be an overly broad generalization. Often, fibrotically active fibroblasts are defined as cells staining positively for α-smooth muscle actin (αSMA) and the fibronectin splice variant EDA (FN EDA Tomasek et al.
