Preliminary Research of Relationship between Acute Peritonitis and Celiac Primo Vessels

Essential Experimental Methods for Identifying Bonghan Systems as a Basis for Korean Medicine: Focusing on Visual Materials from Original Papers and Modern Outcomes

In the 1960s, through studies on Korean Medicine, Bonghan Kim proposed the Bonghan systems (BS) as the anatomical reality of the acupuncture meridians based on various experimental data. Since 2002, several groups, mainly led by a team at Seoul National University, who renamed the BS as the primo vascular system (PVS), have published around 70 papers showing biological structures corresponding to the BS. However, it is still difficult for other researchers to find them, especially under the skin, which Bonghan Kim first reported as acupuncture points, due to similar-looking biological tissues, for example, the lymphatic vessels, and such artifacts as blood clots or fascia debris. To solve these drawbacks, we examined the main methods for identifying the BS by comparing the original papers with the modern outcomes in terms of the common physical/chemical characteristics of the BS. In addition, effective methods of staining and microscopic observations discovered by modern teams are synthetically explained using visual materials such as diagrams and photos. Through the essentially organized methods in this review paper, we suggest that one can find the BS under the skin as putative acupuncture points by tracing the intraexternal BS, from which a new Korean Medicine will be born.

Identification of Primo-Vascular System in Abdominal Subcutaneous Tissue Layer of Rats

The primo-vascular system (PVS) is a novel network identified in various animal tissues. However, the PVS in subcutaneous tissue has not been well identified. Here, we examined the putative PVS on the surface of abdominal subcutaneous tissue in rats. Hemacolor staining revealed dark blue threadlike structures consisting of nodes and vessels, which were frequently observed bundled with blood vessels. The structure was filled with various immune cells including mast cells and WBCs. In the structure, there were inner spaces (20–60 µm) with low cellularity. Electron microscopy revealed a bundle structure and typical cytology common with the well-established organ surface PVS, which were different from those of the lymphatic vessel. Among several subcutaneous (sc) PVS tissues identified on the rat abdominal space, the most outstanding was the scPVS aligned along the ventral midline. The distribution pattern of nodes and vessels in the scPVS closely resembled that of the conception vessel meridian and its acupoints. In conclusion, our results newly revealed that the PVS is present in the abdominal subcutaneous tissue layer and indicate that the scPVS tissues are closely correlated with acupuncture meridians. Our findings will help to characterize the PVS in the other superficial tissues and its physiological roles.