Eruptive dermatofibromas in a kindred.

Benign fibrous histiocytomas of the skin, or dermatofibromas, are common fibrohistiocytic tumors that affect women more commonly than men. Proposed causes range from a reactive process to a neoplastic growth. We report on a family affected with numerous dermatofibromas, suggesting that there also may be a genetic cause to this common tumor.

Overexpression of mutant ras in human melanoma increases invasiveness, proliferation and anchorage-independent growth in vitro and induces tumour formation and cachexia in vivo.

Malignant melanoma is the deadliest form of skin cancer. Previous studies have shown that the incidence of ras mutation increases with progression of melanoma, but that such mutations may not be present in the earliest radial growth phase melanomas. Recently it has been proposed that introduction of ras mutations into cells deficient in tumour suppressor genes such as p16 (INK4a) is sufficient to induce characteristics of cellular transformation such as anchorage-independent growth and tumour formation in vivo.

Waldenström macroglobulinemia-induced bullous dermatosis.

Background: Waldenström macroglobulinemia is a plasma cell dyscrasia of undetermined cause characterized by the monoclonal proliferation of lymphoplasmacytes in the bone marrow, lymph nodes, and spleen and elevated circulating levels and tissue deposition of monoclonal IgM produced by these aberrant cells. Rarely, cutaneous manifestations of this disease have been reported.

Observations: We report the case of a patient with bullous dermatosis induced by Waldenström macroglobulinemia and demonstrate the subepidermal location of the separation and the presence of IgM and kappa light chains by immunoperoxidase, immunofluorescent techniques, and electron microscopy with immunogold staining.