These results confirm and extend earlier studies showing that KGF transcripts are elevated in inflammatory bowel disease, but they show for the first time that transcripts are higher in UC than Crohn's disease because of increased production by mucosal mesenchymal cells.
In contrast, KGF receptor transcripts were localized to the cryptal region of the mucosal epithelium in both normal and IBD tissue, with no apparent differences in the level of expression.