One-Dimensional Transient Heat Conduction in Composite Living Perfuse Tissue

Modeling the conduction of heat in living tissue requires the consideration of sudden spatial discontinuities in property values as well as the presence of the body's circulatory system. This paper presents a description of the separation of variables method that results in a remarkably simple solution of transient heat conduction in a perfuse composite slab for which at least one of the layers experiences a zero perfusion rate. The method uses the natural analytic approach and formats the description so that the constants of integration of each composite layer are expressed in terms of those of the previous layer's eigenfunctions. This allows the solution to be “built” in a very systematic and sequential manner. The method is presented in the context of the Pennes bioheat equation for which the solution is developed for a system composed of any number of N layers with arbitrary initial conditions.

Quantitation of collateral and ischemic flows with microspheres and diffusible indicator

Flow to myocardium following coronary occlusion may not originate solely from collateral channels. Some flow might be derived from overlapping coronary arteries which also perfuse tissue within the territory of the obstructed vessel prior to occlusion. Left atrial microsphere injection during perfusion of the left anterior descending (LAD) artery from a special reservoir containing microsphere-free blood and again after LAD occlusion permitted measurement of noncollateral overlap and total ischemic LAD (TIF) flows, respectively, and mathematical derivation of true collateral flow (TCF). Whereas TIF averaged 0.25 +/- 0.03 ml/min per g, TCF was 0.14 +/- 0.03 ml/min per g, only 50.6% of TIF. The remainder of the TIF represented either inadvertant inclusion of normally perfused tissue with the ischemic LAD myocardium or actual overlap of LAD and left circumflex circulations. 86RbCl was injected simultaneously with the microspheres following coronary occlusion. 86Rb and microsphere densities in the whole heart and ischemic area were closely correlated, although microsphere distribution tended to be more heterogeneous. No segment of ischemic myocardium containing 86Rb was free of microspheres. Therefore, the geometry of undeveloped collateral channels is adequate to permit passage of 15-micron particles. Absolute 86Rb flows were consistently less than microsphere flows.

Attempts to establish New Experimental Methods to study Antitumoral Drugs

SummaryThis paper summarizes some studies recently carried out in this Institute in the field of cancer chemotherapy.Three main groups of data are reported:a) different sensitivity to chemotherapy of the same tumor transplanted in different sites of the body;b) a method to study cancer dissemination as a basis for cancer chemotherapy;c) a system to perfuse tissue culture with the blood of living animals as an approach to study duration of action of antitumoral drugs.