Virchows Archiv : An International Journal of Pathology

Primary squamous cell carcinoma of the parotid gland (pSCCP) has long been recognized as a separate entity and is included in the WHO classifications of salivary gland tumors. However, it is widely accepted among head and neck pathologists that pSCCP is exceptionally rare. Yet, there are many publications describing series of pSCCP and data from SEER and other cancer register databases indicate erroneously an increasing incidence of pSCCP. Importantly, pSCCP and metastatic (secondary) squamous cell carcinoma to the parotid gland (mSCCP) have nearly identical histological features, and the diagnosis of pSCCP should only be made after the exclusion of mSCCP...

High-grade serous ovarian carcinoma (HGSOC) can be categorized into four gene expression-based subtypes, with supposedly distinct prognoses and treatment responses. Murakami et al. translated these gene expression-based subtypes into the histopathological mesenchymal, immunoreactive, solid and proliferative, and papilloglandular subtypes, showing differences in survival outcomes. Miyagawa et al. refined these criteria to improve the interobserver concordance. The current retrospective study evaluated the interobserver variability and the prognostic differences between the histopathologic subtypes using the criteria of both Murakami et al...

A syndromic association between a subset of testicular/paratesticular neoplasms is well established. Such examples include Carney complex and large cell calcifying Sertoli cell tumor, Peutz-Jeghers syndrome and intratubular large cell hyalinizing Sertoli cell neoplasia, and VHL syndrome and clear cell papillary cystadenoma of the epididymis.However, recent studies proposed potential novel links between some testicular and paratesticular neoplasms with certain tumor syndromes. While more studies are still needed to solidify these associations, recent research suggests that a subset of Leydig cell tumors may arise in patients with hereditary leiomyomatosis and renal cell carcinoma syndrome or that some seminomas may occur in Lynch syndrome patients...

The classical BCR::ABL1-negative myeloproliferative neoplasms (MPN) form a group of bone marrow (BM) diseases with the potential to progress to acute myeloid leukemia or develop marrow fibrosis and subsequent BM failure. The mechanism by which BM fibrosis develops and the factors that drive stromal activation and fibrosis are not well understood. Cellular Communication Network 2 (CCN2), also known as CTGF (Connective Tissue Growth Factor), is a profibrotic matricellular protein functioning as an important driver and biomarker of fibrosis in a wide range of diseases outside the marrow...

Based on lineage-specific transcription factors, small-cell neuroendocrine carcinoma (SmCC) of the urinary bladder has recently been subtyped into three molecular subtypes: ASCL1, NEUROD1 and POU2F3. The latter is a master transcriptional regulator of tuft cells (TCs) which are rare solitary cells found in various mucosal epithelia such as the gastrointestinal tract, but which have not been reported in the bladder. The POU2F3 subtype shows low or absent neuroendocrine marker expression. A case of mixed SmCC and conventional-type urothelial carcinoma (CUC) of the urinary bladder with POU2F3-expressing intraepithelial small-cell carcinoma in keeping with a tuft cell phenotype, arising in association with intestinal metaplasia (IM) is described...

No abstract text is available yet for this article.

Assessing programmed death ligand 1 (PD-L1) expression on tumor cells (TCs) using Food and Drug Administration-approved, validated immunoassays can guide the use of immune checkpoint inhibitor (ICI) therapy in cancer treatment. However, substantial interobserver variability has been reported using these immunoassays. Artificial intelligence (AI) has the potential to accurately measure biomarker expression in tissue samples, but its reliability and comparability to standard manual scoring remain to be evaluated...

Urothelial carcinoma (UC) of the bladder is a common cause of cancer-related death worldwide. Vasculogenic mimicry (VM) is a process by which the malignant cells can generate vascular-like structures formed of periodic acid-Schiff (PAS) positive/CD31 negative extracellular matrix independent of angiogenesis and thus promotes tumor progression. N-myc downstream-regulated gene 1 (NDRG1) is a protein that can modulate tumor angiogenesis; however, its role in regulating tumor angiogenesis and VM formation has not been previously investigated in UC...

Currently, it is difficult to predict the prognosis of myxoid liposarcoma (MLS) in biopsy specimens. In this study, we determined whether nuclear morphology may be used to predict the prognosis of MLS in primary biopsy specimens. Two pathologists evaluated nuclear morphology using the modified WHO/ISUP and Fuhrman grades. Survival analyses were performed by grouping nuclear high- and low-grades. We examined 53 MLS cases, which included 29 (54.7%) male and 24 (45.3%) female patients with a median age of 46 years (interquartile range, 37 - 60)...

Genetic alterations including fusions in fibroblast growth factor receptor 2 (FGFR2) are detected in 10-20% of intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma (iCCA), and FGFR2 inhibitors are effective for the treatment of iCCA. We examined a prevalence of FGFR2 genetic alterations and their clinicopathological significance in combined hepatocellular-cholangiocarcinoma (cHCC-CCA). FGFR2 expression, which is a surrogate marker for FGFR2 genetic alterations, was immunohistochemically assessed in the liver sections from 75 patients with cHCC-CCA, 35 with small duct-type iCCA, 30 with large duct-type iCCA, and 35 with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC)...

The estimation of tumor cellular fraction (TCF) is a crucial step in predictive molecular pathology, representing an entry adequacy criterion also in the next-generation sequencing (NGS) era. However, heterogeneity of quantification practices and inter-pathologist variability hamper the robustness of its evaluation, stressing the need for more reliable results. Here, 121 routine histological samples from non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) cases with complete NGS profiling were used to evaluate TCF interobserver variability among three different pathologists (pTCF), developing a computational tool (cTCF) and assessing its reliability vs ground truth (GT) tumor cellularity and potential impact on the final molecular results...

No abstract text is available yet for this article.

We report on two cases of orthotopic liver transplantation (OLTX) due to SARS-Cov2-associated secondary sclerosing cholangitis (SSC) following long-term artificial respiration and extra-corporal membrane oxygenation in intensive care. Under these conditions, SSC is a rapidly progredient biliary disease featuring degenerative cholangiopathy, loss of bile ducts, ductular and parenchymal cholestasis, biliary fibrosis, and finally cirrhosis. Reduced perfusion and oxygenation of the peribiliary plexus, severe concurrent infections, and secondary medico-toxic effects appear to play a crucial role in the pathogenesis of the disease...

Mutations in the TP53 gene, most commonly observed in colorectal cancer (CRC), play an essential role in colorectal carcinogenesis. Although p53 immunohistochemical (IHC) expression patterns have been argued to serve as an excellent surrogate marker for TP53 mutations, its performance has not been confirmed in CRC. We aimed to determine whether p53 IHC expression patterns accurately predict TP53 mutation status as examined by next-generation sequencing (NGS). We performed p53 IHC and sequencing of TP53 by NGS in 92 CRC cases with a microsatellite stable phenotype to investigate the correlation between TP53 mutation status and p53 IHC expression...

Research on the DNA methylation status of gastric cancer (GC) has primarily focused on identifying invasive GC to develop biomarkers for diagnostic. However, DNA methylation in noninvasive GC remains unclear. We conducted a comprehensive DNA methylation profiling study of differentiated-type intramucosal GCs (IMCs). Illumina 850K microarrays were utilized to assess the DNA methylation profiles of formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded tissues from eight patients who were Epstein-Barr virus-negative and DNA mismatch repair proficient, including IMCs and paired adjacent nontumor mucosa...

New generation ultra-fast fluorescence confocal microscopy (UFCM) allows to image histological architecture of fresh breast tissue and may be used for ex vivo intraoperative analysis for margin status. The criteria to identify breast tumoral and non-tumoral tissues in UFCM images are still objects of investigation. The objective of the study was to create an atlas of ex vivo UFCM images of breast tissues and breast carcinomas based on the first extensive collection of large field-of-view UFCM breast images...

Diagnosis of desmoid-type fibromatosis (DF) may be challenging on biopsy due to morphologic overlap with reactive fibrosis (scar) and other uniform spindle cell neoplasms. Evaluation of nuclear β-catenin, a surrogate of Wnt pathway activation, is often difficult in DF due to weak nuclear expression and high background membranous/cytoplasmic staining. Lymphoid enhancer-factor 1 (LEF1) is a recently characterized effector partner of β-catenin which activates the transcription of target genes. We investigated the performance of LEF1 and β-catenin immunohistochemistry in a retrospective series of 156 soft tissue tumors, including 35 DF, 3 superficial fibromatosis, and 121 histologic mimics (19 soft tissue perineurioma, 8 colorectal perineurioma, 4 intraneural perineurioma, 26 scars, 23 nodular fasciitis, 6 low-grade fibromyxoid sarcomas, 6 angioleiomyomas, 5 neurofibromas, 5 dermatofibrosarcoma protuberans, 3 low-grade myofibroblastic sarcomas, 3 synovial sarcomas, 3 inflammatory myofibroblastic tumors, 2 schwannomas, and 1 each of Gardner-associated fibroma, radiation-associated spindle cell sarcoma, sclerotic fibroma, dermatofibroma, and glomus tumor)...

Neuroplacentology is an expanding field of interest that addresses the placental influence on fetal and neonatal brain lesions and on further neurodevelopment. The objective of this study was to clarify the link between placental pathology and perinatal arterial ischemic stroke (PAIS). Prior publications have reported different types of perinatal stroke with diverse methodologies precluding firm conclusions. We report here the histological placental findings in a series of 16 neonates with radiologically confirmed PAIS...

Intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma (ICC) is a highly aggressive malignant neoplasm. Certain histologic features and the tumor microenvironment may impact disease progression. We aim to characterize the clinicopathologic features of ICC to identify prognostic factors. A total of 50 surgically resected ICC (partial or transplant) cases were analyzed. The cohort included 26 men and 24 women with a median age of 62 years. Eighteen (36%) cases were multifocal ICC with a mean largest tumor size of 6.5 cm. Neoadjuvant and adjuvant chemotherapy was done in eight (16%) and 33 (66%) patients, respectively...

Vasculogenic mesenchymal lesions (VMLs) of germ cell tumor origin are thought to originate in postpubertal-type yolk sac tumor components and include a spectrum of lesions from teratoma with vasculogenic stroma (TVS), to low and high-grade vasculogenic mesenchymal tumors (VMTs). VMLs exhibit rudimentary to well-developed neoplastic vessels within primitive mesenchyme, being considered a neoplastic reiteration of embryonic vasculogenesis in the splanchnic mesoderm of the yolk sac. They occur in patients with primary mediastinal germ cell tumors after chemotherapy, and a subset progresses to "somatic-type" sarcomas [including angiosarcoma (AS)], with high-grade VMTs likely portending a higher risk...