A Review of Fetal Scarless Healing

Table 2

Summary of differences identified in fetal wound healing.

	Fetal wound healing
Inflammation	Reduced immune cells, less activated, lower levels of cytokines, and growth factors due to reduced immune cells [5–9]; Decreased expression IL-6 and IL-8 [16, 17]; Low levels of COX-2 and PGE2 [25]; Appear refractory to exogenous PGE2 [27]
ECM	Higher expression of hyaluronic acid [30, 31]; Increased CD44 (hyaluronic acid receptor) [33]; Tenascin C earlier deposition [42, 43]; Increased expression of some subunits integrins [45]; Fibronectin isoforms; Reduced decorin [46]; Increase fibromodulin [49]; Collagen ratio remain unclear but fetal wounds [51, 52]; Have reduced cross-linking but increased expression DDR [57]; Increased levels of MMPs and urokinase plasminogen activator reduced TIMPs and PAI-1 [58, 59]
Wound closure	Myofibroblasts quick but transitory appearance [67, 68]; Close wounds by actin cable [61, 62]
Growth factors	See Table 1
Cell-signalling transcription and gene expression	Difference in phosphorylation in some intracellular signalling pathways [88, 89]; Transient increase in AP-1 [93]; Hox gene expression differ [98, 99]
Cell behaviour	Increased cleaved caspase 7; Increased cleaved PARP [106]