Lois A. Salamonsen

Embryo implantation within the uterus is critical for the establishment of pregnancy and is an important issue in infertility [...].

Uniquely among adult tissues, the human endometrium undergoes cyclical shedding, scar-free repair and regeneration during a woman's reproductive life. Therefore, it presents an outstanding model for study of such processes. This Review exam…

The focus of my life in science has been to improve reproductive health for women, with an emphasis on the endometrium, the most dynamic tissue in the human body: its remarkable cyclical remodelling is essential for the establishment of pre…

Extensive evidence suggests that the release of membrane-enclosed compartments, more commonly known as extracellular vesicles (EVs), is a potent newly identified mechanism of cell-to-cell communication both in normal physiology and in patho…

The human endometrium is a highly dynamic tissue that is cyclically shed, repaired, regenerated and remodelled, primarily under the orchestration of oestrogen and progesterone, in preparation for embryo implantation. Humans are among the ve…

Considerable correlative evidence suggests an important role for matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs) in menstruation, a pro-cess which occurs naturally in very few species. In this study, MMP expression was examined in a mouse model of endome-…

Embryo implantation requires synchronized dialogue between the receptive endometrium and activated blastocyst via locally produced soluble mediators. During the mid-secretory (MS) phase of the menstrual cycle, increased glandular secretion …

Embryo implantation and subsequent placentation require a fine balanced fetal-maternal cross-talk of hormones, cytokines and chemokines. Amongst the group of chemokines, CX3CL1 (also known as fractalkine) has recently attracted attention in…

Menstruation is a complex process dependent on premenstrual release of inflammatory mediators and proteolytic enzymes from endometrial cells. Endometrial leukocytes are traditionally considered to be the major source of the inflammatory fac…

Menstruation involves the shedding of the functional layer of the endometrium in the absence of pregnancy. At sites where tissue shedding is complete, re-epithelialization of the tissue is essential for repair and termination of bleeding. T…

BACKGROUND: 'Omics' high-throughput analyses, including genomics, epigenomics, transcriptomics, proteomics and metabolomics, are widely applied in human endometrial studies. Analysis of endometrial transcriptome patterns in physiological an…

Exosomes are nanoparticles (∼100 nm diameter) released from cells, which can transfer small RNAs and mRNA via the extracellular environment to cells at distant sites. We hypothesised that exosomes or the slightly larger microvesicles (100-3…

BACKGROUND: Synchronous development of the endometrium (to achieve a receptive state) and of the embryo is essential for successful implantation and ongoing pregnancy. Endometrial receptivity exists only for a finite time in a menstrual cyc…

Failure of the endometrium to achieve receptivity results in infertility, and it is also a rate-limiting step in in vitro fertilization (IVF) success. The microenvironments provided by the endometrium during the receptive phase and that sup…

Proteomics techniques have been applied to identify proteins for development as diagnostic markers of endometriosis, but to date most studies have been unable to overcome the presence of highly abundant proteins. The main issues to be resol…

Repair of the postmenstrual endometrium presents a unique opportunity to examine nonscarring repair in an adult tissue. We aimed to characterize and determine the importance of extracellular matrix (ECM) dynamics in cell migration during en…

While the molecular mechanisms underlying endometrial destruction at menstruation are somewhat understood, the factors which govern post-menstrual repair remain somewhat of a mystery. The elegant electron micrograph work of Ludwig et al. ha…

Female-controlled contraception/HIV prevention is critical to address health issues associated with gender inequality. Therefore, a contraceptive which can be administered in tandem with a microbicide to inhibit sexually transmitted infecti…

BACKGROUND: During implantation, the embryo adheres to the endometrium via cell adhesion molecules (CAMs) present on blastocyst trophectoderm and endometrial epithelial cells. CAMs, including integrins and extracellular matrix (ECM) ligands…