Ovarian adenocarcinomas express fms-complementary transcripts and fms antigen, often with coexpression of CSF-1.

In earlier studies of oncogene expression in ovarian and endometrial neoplasms, the authors reported that high tumor levels of fms-complementary transcripts correlate with high histologic grade and advanced clinical stage presentations. In this communication, they pursue these initial clinicopathologic investigations to demonstrate by in situ hybridization and immunohistochemistry that malignant epithelial cells of 14 of 14 invasive adenocarcinomas of the ovary express fms-complementary transcripts. By Northern blotting and by reverse transcription, followed by polymerase chain reaction amplification, the authors also were able to demonstrate fms transcript expression in several ovarian and endometrial carcinoma-derived cell lines. Because about half (6/14) of the invasive adenocarcinoma specimens were shown to coexpress fms and colony-stimulating factor 1, the authors propose that the expression of this lymphohematopoietic cytokine and its receptor by ovarian adenocarcinomas could contribute to their proliferative and invasive characteristics in vivo.

Colposcopic assessment in microinvasive carcinoma of the cervix.

Forty of the 87 patients with microinvasive carcinoma (MIC) of the uterine cervix who underwent surgery were diagnosed colposcopically and the results were compared with the cytological and histological diagnoses. The cytology showed preinvasive carcinoma in 20 (50.0%) patients and invasive carcinoma in 19 (47.5%) patients. A correct colposcopic diagnosis was made in nine (22.5%) patients as having microinvasive carcinoma, 21 (52.5%) patients preinvasive carcinoma and eight (20%) patients invasive carcinoma, to sum up accuracy rate as 32.1%. The abnormalities most commonly observed in colposcopy were mosaic, punctuation and white epithelium. In microinvasive carcinoma, the triad co-existed in 43% of the patients. Atypical vessels, characteristic of invasion, were found in only one third of the patients. Microinvasion, therefore, may not be evident on colposcopy alone. It is therefore necessary to apply cone biopsy, prior to definite therapy, to make an accurate assessment of the maximum depth and extent of the invasion prior to definitive therapy.

Isolation and characterization of rat trophoblast cells.

Previous immunohistochemical studies of the rat placenta using specific alloantisera and/or monoclonal antibodies showed that the basal zone trophoblasts stained for Pa and Aa class I major histocompatibility complex (MHC) antigens and for the human SP1-related antigen. In an effort to isolate the basal zone trophoblast cells from the rat placenta, we used these markers to assess the degree of purification of the cells separated by density gradient centrifugation using either Ficoll-Hypaque or Percoll as the gradient medium. The cells were put either on the top or at the bottom of discontinuous density gradients in the range of 1.005-1.10 g/ml. The cell separation profiles for the two media were different. With Percoll, most of the trophoblast cells (80-95%) were collected at the density gradients 1.04/1.06 and 1.06/1.08, whereas with Ficoll-Hypaque, these gradients separated only a small fraction (4-23%) of the trophoblast cells, and most of them pelleted at the bottom of the tube. The trophoblast cells separated by Ficoll-Hypaque, however, showed fewer contaminant cells than those separated by the Percoll gradients.