{"doi":"10.3390/ijms21072522","title":"Imatinib Sets Pericyte Mosaic in the Retina","abstract":"The nervous system demands an adequate oxygen and metabolite exchange, making pericytes (PCs), the only vasoactive cells on the capillaries, essential to neural function. Loss of PCs is a hallmark of multiple diseases, including diabetes, Alzheimer's, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and Parkinson's. Platelet-derived growth factor receptors (PDGFRs) have been shown to be critical to PC function and survival. However, how PDGFR-mediated PC activity affects vascular homeostasis is not fully understood. Here, we tested the hypothesis that imatinib, a chemotherapeutic agent and a potent PDGFR inhibitor, alters PC distribution and thus induces vascular atrophy. We performed a morphometric analysis of the vascular elements in sham control and imatinib-treated NG2-DsRed mice. Vascular morphology and the integrity of the blood-retina barrier (BRB) were evaluated using blood albumin labeling. We found that imatinib decreased the number of PCs and blood vessel (BV) coverage in all retinal vascular layers; this was accompanied by a shrinkage of BV diameters. Surprisingly, the total length of capillaries was not altered, suggesting a preferential effect of imatinib on PCs. Furthermore, blood-retina barrier disruption was not evident. In conclusion, our data suggest that imatinib could help in treating neurovascular diseases and serve as a model for PC loss, without BRB disruption.","journal":"International Journal of Molecular Sciences","year":2020,"id":84435,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":9,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9556,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2020-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":280116,"name":"Elena Ivanova","orcid":null,"position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":432908,"name":"Gergely Szarka","orcid":"0000-0001-8121-2600","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":433470,"name":"Ádám J Tengölics","orcid":null,"position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":432909,"name":"Béla Völgyi","orcid":"0000-0001-7481-390X","position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":278341,"name":"Botir T. Sagdullaev","orcid":"0000-0002-0611-1479","position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":278339,"name":"Tamás Kovács‐Öller","orcid":"0000-0002-3353-4485","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":50,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-18T21:54:50.827092Z","pmid":"32260484","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}