Summary
Background
Fat grafting has been shown clinically to improve the quality of burn scars. To date,
no study has explored the mechanism of this effect. We aimed to do so by combining
our murine model of fat grafting with a previously described murine model of thermal
injury.
Methods
Wild-type FVB mice (n=20) were anaesthetised, shaved and depilitated. Brass rods were heated to 100 °C in a hot water bath before being applied to the dorsum of the mice for 10 s, yielding a full-thickness injury. Following a 2-week recovery period, the mice
underwent Doppler scanning before being fat/sham grafted with 1.5 cc of human fat/saline. Half were sacrificed 4 weeks following grafting, and half
were sacrificed 8 weeks following grafting. Both groups underwent repeat Doppler scanning
immediately prior to sacrifice. Burn scar samples were taken following sacrifice at
both time points for protein quantification, CD31 staining and Picrosirius red staining.
Results
Doppler scanning demonstrated significantly greater flux in fat-grafted animals than
saline-grafted animals at 4 weeks (fat=305±15.77 mV, saline=242±15.83 mV; p=0.026). Enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) analysis in fat-grafted animals
demonstrated significant increase in vasculogenic proteins at 4 weeks (vascular endothelial
growth factor (VEGF): fat=74.3±4.39 ngml–1, saline=34.3±5.23 ngml–1; p=0.004) (stromal cell-derived factor-1 (SDF-1): fat=51.8±1.23 ngml–1, saline grafted=10.2±3.22 ngml–1; p<0.001) and significant decreases in fibrotic markers at 8 weeks (transforming growth
factor-ß1(TGF-ß): saline=9.30±0.93, fat=4.63±0.38 ngml–1; p=0.002) (matrix metallopeptidase 9 (MMP9): saline=13.05±1.21 ngml–1, fat=6.83±1.39 ngml–1; p=0.010). CD31 staining demonstrated significantly up-regulated vascularity at 4 weeks
in fat-grafted animals (fat=30.8±3.39 vessels per high power field (hpf), saline=20.0±0.91 vessels per high power field (hpf); p=0.029). Sirius red staining demonstrated significantly reduced scar index in fat-grafted
animals at 8 weeks (fat=0.69±0.10, saline=2.03±0.53; p=0.046).
Conclusions
Fat grafting resulted in more rapid revascularisation at the burn site as measured
by laser Doppler flow, CD31 staining and chemical markers of angiogenesis. In turn,
this resulted in decreased fibrosis as measured by Sirius red staining and chemical
markers.
Keywords
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Article info
Publication history
Published online: October 03, 2011
Accepted:
August 24,
2011
Received:
April 21,
2011
Footnotes
☆Presented in part at: iFats Annual Conference – Dallas, TX, USA, October 2010, Northeastern Society of Plastic Surgeons Annual Meeting – Washington D.C., USA, October 2010.
Identification
Copyright
© 2011 British Association of Plastic, Reconstructive and Aesthetic Surgeons. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
