Scientific spat erupts over claim that bones have key immune vessels
Science - AAAS · 2026-08-20
A significant scientific dispute has erupted over the 2023 claim by University of Oxford cell biologist Anjali Kusumbe and colleagues that healthy bone contains lymphatic vessels, a notion previously believed false except in rare conditions like Gorham-Stout disease. Kusumbe's team presented 3D imaging of mouse and human bones, showing protein markers associated with lymphatic endothelial cells (LECs) in tubelike structures, alongside gene expression analyses. They also reported impaired bone healing in mice after LEC destruction.
However, a group including Ralf Adams from the Max Planck Institute and Bin Zhou from the Chinese Academy of Sciences challenged these findings. Their replication efforts suggested the 2023 paper's imaging and gene analyses did not adequately distinguish internal from external lymphatic vessels, and the LEC markers could identify other cell types. They also argued that toxins used to kill LECs likely affected other cells, broadly impairing mouse health and thus bone healing. Their own experiments, using different genetic analyses and 2D imaging on normal bone, found no evidence of lymphatic vessels in healthy contexts, though they did detect them in mice mimicking Gorham-Stout disease.
The controversy led to a publication delay at *Cell* journal, which originally planned to release both papers on July 15. Adams raised concerns about the initial rebuttal from Kusumbe's team, prompting substantial edits to remove broad criticisms of Adams's prior work. Many in the scientific community, including Graeme Birdsey and Ben Hogan, find the criticisms compelling, suggesting the difficulty in reproducing the original findings points to issues. The debate continues, with implications for understanding bone healing and immune function.
*The full article also explores the implications for Cell's editorial process and future research directions on bone lymphatics.*