This method for the registration of prostate digital histopathologic images to in vivo MR images acquired by using an endorectal receive coil was sufficiently accurate for coregistering the smallest clinically important lesions with 95% confidence.

Aims-To evaluate the expression of vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) in uveal melanomas and correlate its presence with tumour characteristics and systemic metastasis. Methods-47 cases of ciliochoroidal melanoma enucleated between 1983 and 1993 were retrieved from the pathology archives at the University of Western Ontario. ParaYn sections stained with haematoxylin and eosin, periodic acid SchiV, and periodic acid SchiV without haematoxylin after bleaching of melanin were examined. The expression of VEGF protein was examined by an immunoalkaline phosphatase method following antigen retrieval, using an antibody to VEGF and vector red as the chromogen. The intensity of VEGF immunoreactivity was graded on a scale of 0-7 and correlated with tumour cell type, tumour size, presence or absence of necrosis, pigmentation, mitotic activity, microvascular density, and microvascular pattern. Results-VEGF immunoreactivity was present in 44/47 tumours (94%): the intensity was graded as very weak (1-2) in 29/47 (62%) and as weak or greater in 15/47 (32%). VEGF was also found in the ciliary epithelium, smooth muscle of the ciliary body and iris, retinal ganglion cells, inner photoreceptor segments, and the retinal pigment epithelium. Follow up data were available in 43/47 patients (91.5%), with a median follow up time of 10 years. 16/43 (37%) patients developed metastases. VEGF expression in melanoma was linked to the presence of tumour necrosis and the degree of pigmentation but no statistically significant relation with microvascular pattern, tumour size, or microvascular density was found. There was no statistically significant correlation between VEGF expression and metastasis. Conclusions-Most ciliochoroidal melanomas express VEGF and expression is correlated with the presence of necrosis but not with the occurrence of systemic metastasis or tumour angiogenesis. (Br J Ophthalmol 2000;84:750-756)

The proposed method registers digital histology to prostate MR images, yielding 70% reduced processing time and mean accuracy sufficient to achieve 85% overlap on histology and ex vivo MR images for a 0.2 cc spherical tumor.

Intractable or drug-resistant epilepsy occurs in to 30% of epilepsy patients, with many of these patients undergoing surgical excision of the affected brain region to achieve seizure control. Recent magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) sequences and analysis techniques have the potential to detect abnormalities not identified with diagnostic MRI protocols. Prospective studies involving pre-operative imaging and collection of surgically-resected tissue provide a unique opportunity for verification and tuning of these image analysis techniques, since direct comparison can be made against histopathology, and can lead to better prediction of surgical outcomes and potentially less invasive procedures. To carry out MRI and histology comparison, spatial correspondence between the MR images and the histology images must be found. Towards this goal, a novel pipeline is presented here for bringing ex-vivo MRI of surgically-resected temporal lobe specimens and digital histology into spatial correspondence. The sparsely-sectioned histology images represent a challenge for 3D reconstruction which we address with a combined 3D and 2D registration algorithm that alternates between slice-based and volume-based registration with the ex-vivo MRI. We evaluated our registration method on specimens resected from patients undergoing anterior temporal lobectomy (N=7) and found our method to have a mean target registration error of 0.76 ± 0.66 and 0.98 ± 0.60 mm for hippocampal and neocortical specimens respectively. This work allows for the spatially-local comparison of histology with post-operative MRI and paves the way for eventual correlation with pre-operative MRI image analysis techniques.