3-DIMENSIONAL ARCHITECTURE OF HUMAN CUTANEOUS VASCULAR-LESIONS - A SCANNING ELECTRON-MICROSCOPIC STUDY OF CORROSION CASTS

Corrosion casts were made from angiosarcoma of the scalp of an elderly person, Klippel-Trenaunay syndrome, pseudo-Kaposi's sarcoma, diffuse neonatal hemangiomatosis, cavernous hemangioma and arteriovenous malfo rmation and were examined by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), The n ormal scalp from a cadaver was studied as a control for the angiosarco ma of the scalp. The SEM of the vascular corrosion casts clearly demon strated the fine three dimensional (3-D) architectures of malignant an d benign cutaneous vascular lesions; the superficial fine and medium-s ized vascular networks of the skin were replaced by abnormal balloon-l ike dilatations, extravasated fringes, glomerular structures, sinusoid al vessels or localized bulla-like structures of the capillary loops, depending on the nature of the cutaneous vascular lesions, The corrosi on cast technique is helpful for understanding the 3-D patterns of var ious vascular lesions.