In a series of experiments planned for the purpose of injecting the vessels in the heart valves, a colloidal suspension of carbon particles was injected into the coronary arteries of human hearts which had been excised at autopsy. When one came to study the injected specimens it was soon observed not only that the vessels in the heart were filled with the carbon particles but also that the arteries in attached flaps of the parietal pericardium contained the injection mass. Further observation showed that an extensive network of vessels in the adventitia of the aorta and pulmonary artery was also injected.These observations led to a more thorough study of theextracardiac anastomoses of the coronary arteries. The results of this investigation are reported here.The literature furnishes little if any detailed description of the extracardiac anastomoses of the coronary arteries. The most instructive paper is that of I~nger (4) who, during a study of the Thebesian vessels by coronary artery injection, described branches of the coronary arteries anastomosing with vessels in the mediastinum, the parietal pericardium, the diaphragm and the hila of the lungs. Woodruff (10) in 1926 called attention to anastomoses of branches of the coronary arteries with the vasa vasorum of the ascending aorta. In 1928 Wearn (9) noted that on injecting the coronary arteries with India ink or Berlin blue the vessels in the ascending aorta were filled with the injection mass. Robertson (6) in 1930 pointed out the importance of the arteries of the fat pads of the heart in the presence of disease of the coronary arteries. He discussed also the anastomoses of branches of the coronary arteries with the periadventitial vessels of the ascending aorta and other vessels of the thorax. Several reviews of the literature including those

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In a 3-dimensional reconstruction of the vascular system of a duodenal villus of rat, special endothelia which lack the interendothelial contacts (seamless endothelia) have been studied. They are perforated by the lumen instead of wrapping it. They only occur in the interconnected small capillaries while they are lacking in the main loops. This distribution may be due to the way in which these special endothelia develop.

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