1. Cell Biology
  2. Medicine

Endometriosis is not the endometrium: Reviewing the over-representation of eutopic endometrium in endometriosis research

  1. Kate Gunther
  2. Teagan Fisher
  3. Dongli Liu
  4. Jason Abbott
  5. Caroline Elizabeth Ford  Is a corresponding author
  1. Gynaecological Cancer Research Group, Lowy Cancer Research Centre, School of Clinical Medicine, Faculty of Medicine & Health, UNSW Sydney, Australia
  2. Gynaecological Research and Clinical Evaluation (GRACE) Unit, Royal Hospital for Women, Australia
  3. National Endometriosis Clinical and Scientific Trials (NECST) Network, Australia
  4. Discipline of Women’s Health, School of Clinical Medicine, UNSW Sydney, Australia
  5. Translational Oncology Group, School of Life Sciences, Faculty of Science, University of Technology Sydney, Australia
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.103825
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Cite this article
  1. Kate Gunther
  2. Teagan Fisher
  3. Dongli Liu
  4. Jason Abbott
  5. Caroline Elizabeth Ford
(2025)
Endometriosis is not the endometrium: Reviewing the over-representation of eutopic endometrium in endometriosis research
eLife 14:e103825.
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.103825
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  3. Download .RIS
3 figures, 1 table and 1 additional file

Figures

Figure 1
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Flow chart of search and screening process for review of publicly available endometriosis datasets.
Figure 2
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Biospecimen sample source for publicly available endometriosis datasets.

(A) Overall percentage of each sample type according to biospecimen source, whether from endometriosis or non-endometriosis (non-endo). (B) Type of biological control for endometriosis tissue datasets. (C) Breakdown of biospecimen source and number of published datasets per year, 2007–2024. All primary cell cultures and immortalised cell lines derived from endometriosis tissues (endometriotic cells). Note percentages do not amount to 100.00 in (A) due to three datasets containing more than one biospecimen type. This figure was created using BioRender.com.

Figure 3
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Proposed biospecimen types which could be used to answer key research priorities in endometriosis.

Circles corresponding to biospecimen type are not scaled. Topics in bold discussed in this review. This figure was created using BioRender.com.

Tables

Table 1
Review of publicly available endometriosis datasets.
NumberPercentageDatasets
Endometrium only4536.89Endometrial datasets
Tissue2555.56GSE101176, GSE11768, GSE107469, GSE120103, GSE130028, GSE130435, GSE134052, GSE134056, GSE135485, GSE135640, GSE139954, GSE145702, GSE14808, GSE153739, GSE153740, GSE172172, GSE174305, GSE167946, GSE17504, GSE188915, GSE19834, GSE216255, GSE202571, GSE203191, GSE223817, GSE232713, GSE31683, GSE35287, GSE40007, GSE51981, GSE6364, GSE7305, GSE73622, GSE73950, GSE94414, GSE85701, GSE7846, GSE262037, GSE193928, GSE268541, GSE212787, GSE272606, GSE275002, E-MTAB-14039, E-MTAB-14058
Cells2044.44
Immortal cell line1310.66Cell line datasets
12Z753.85GSE114332, GSE68104, GSE86572, GSE97373, GSE261931, GSE184431, GSE152661, GSE157735, GSE174741, GSE190549, GSE202661, GSE210201, GSE279835
EEC16538.46
iHEECs17.69
Non-lesion endometriosis1411.48Non-lesion endometriosis
Blood and blood vessels964.29GSE168214, GSE57832, GSE205494, GSE220787, GSE192636, E-MEXP-1251, GSE77182, GSE153813, GSE133867, GSE182983, GSE69310, GSE46735, GSE279435, GSE124010
Reproductive tract535.71
Primary tissue culture1713.93Primary culture datasets
Primary cells1694.12GSE124010, GSE121406, GSE135122, GSE136412, GSE31515, GSE40186, GSE44207, GSE47361, GSE58178, GSE67524, GSE75427, GSE87810, GSE243158, GSE132464, GSE269530, GSE168902, GSE118928
Primary organoids16.25
Endometrioma1270.59
No phenotype listed529.41
Stromal1694.12
Epithelial15.88
Without biological control317.65
With biological control1482.35
Normal endometrium only642.86
Eutopic endometrium only535.71
Both eutopic and normal321.43
Additional controls00.00
Endometriosis tissue3629.51Endometriosis tissue datasets
Endometrioma only1952.78GSE279835, GSE11691, GSE197928, GSE12768, GSE141549, GSE15309, GSE157153, GSE16079, GSE179640, GSE185273, GSE196748, GSE201912, GSE213216, GSE226575, GSE230956, GSE23339, GSE239685, GSE246202, GSE25628, GSE26346, GSE37837, GSE5108, GSE56414, GSE57545, GSE71477, GSE7307, GSE86534, GSE99949, GSE229735, GSE105764, GSE248593, GSE281569, GSE247695, E-MTAB-694, GSE94414
Superficial only12.78
Deep infiltrating only12.78
Peritoneal, unknown depth38.33
No phenotype listed411.11
Multiple phenotypes822.22
Without biological control00.00
With biological control36100.00
Normal endometrium only38.33
Eutopic endometrium only1336.11
Endometrium unknown source25.56
Both eutopic and normal25.56
Compared to EAOC616.67
Additional controls1027.78

  1. EAOC, endometriosis-associated ovarian cancer.

  2. Full summary of the reviewed publicly available datasets, their biospecimens, and any associated publications can be found in Supplementary file 1.

Additional files

Supplementary file 1

Review of publicly available datasets for endometriosis.

Contains search methods, exclusion criteria, and links to the source and publications relating to all publicly available datasets as described in the article.

Year of publication, platform, biospecimen type and use of relevant controls also listed.

https://cdn.elifesciences.org/articles/103825/elife-103825-supp1-v1.xlsx

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  1. Kate Gunther
  2. Teagan Fisher
  3. Dongli Liu
  4. Jason Abbott
  5. Caroline Elizabeth Ford
(2025)
Endometriosis is not the endometrium: Reviewing the over-representation of eutopic endometrium in endometriosis research
eLife 14:e103825.
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.103825