ABSTRACT
In 1989, Ferrara and Henzel (1) isolated a diffusible
protein from bovine pituitary follicular cells that
showed cell-specific mitogenic activity for vascular
endothelium. They named this protein vascular endo-
thelial growth factor (VEGF). Further research showed
that VEGF was in fact Michelson’s factor X, which
was the postulated diffusible angiogenesis factor (2).
As discussed in Chapter 5, VEGF was then shown to
have a major role in choroidal neovascularization
