Abstract
Five human meningiomas were studied with techniques of thin section and freeze-fracture. Three specialized junctional complexes, desmonsomes, gap and tight junctions, were found between adjacent plasma membranes. Desmosomes were not shown in freezefracture replicas; they exhibited a charactersstic structure in thin sections. In thin sections the outer leaflets of adjacent plasma membranes of gap junctions appeared to fuse, obliterating the intercellular space. The gap junction in replicas was irregularly ovoid or polygonal in form, mostly 0.1–1.0 μ in diameter, and characterized by a hexagonal aggregation of particles in face A and associated pits in face B. The outer leaflets of adjacent plasma membranes in the tight junction fused at discrete points in thin sections. In replicas, the tight junction was characterized by short complexes of serpentine or ramifying ridges in face A and furrows in face B, and mostly discontinous in distribution. The histogenesis of meningioma cells was discussed from a standpoint of the characteristic features of the specialized intercellular junctions.
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