Hepatocyte growth factor (HGF) is a cytokine that is produced in the placental villous core and acts in a paracrine manner on trophoblasts that express the HGF receptor Met. Because HGF stimulates the invasion of many epithelial cell types, villous core HGF could regulate placental trophoblast invasion. As preeclampsia is characterized by inadequate trophoblast invasion, we investigated the hypothesis that decreased placental HGF production is a mechanism for inadequate trophoblast invasion in this disease. Placental villous explant HGF production over 24 h was 25% lower in patients with preeclampsia (n = 5; 7.29 +/- 0.8 ng/mL) than in normal patients (n = 5; 9.76 +/- 0.5 ng/mL; P < 0.05). The human first trimester trophoblast cell line (ED27) used in subsequent invasion studies was found to express c-met messenger ribonucleic acid by RT-PCR and Met protein by Western analysis, and underwent phosphorylation of tyrosine residues on Met with HGF exposure. A Boyden chamber invasion assay using collagen type I showed that HGF caused a specific dose-response increase in trophoblast invasion first seen at 10 ng/mL (2.2-fold increase; P < 0.05). The stimulation of trophoblast invasion by HGF may in part be due to the 2-fold induction of 92-kDa collagenase as determined by zymogram analysis of the trophoblast-conditioned medium. These studies suggest that HGF has an important role in placental trophoblast invasion through the activation of Met and the subsequent induction of 92-kDa collagenase in these cells. In addition, decreased placental production of HGF in preeclampsia provides a potential mechanism for the lack of trophoblast invasion that is seen in this pregnancy disorder.