The Fine Structure of the Normal Human Alveolocapillary Membrane
- Matthew B. Divertie, MD;
- Arnold L. Brown Jr., MD
Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text.
Excerpt
When WILLIAM ADDISON1 suggested in 1842 that the pulmonary alveoli might be lined by a continuous epithelium, he touched off a controversy which continued for the next 100 years. In 1947 the late William Snow Miller2 in his monograph The Lung stated emphatically that an epithelial lining did exist, but he conceded that there was still a great deal of disagreement on the subject. Among those who agreed that an epithelial lining was present in the normal alveoli, further differences of opinion existed as to whether this was a continuous epithelial lining of nucleated cells or whether small cuboidal nucleated cells were interspersed with non-nucleated plaques. As recently as 1954,3 the conclusion following an electron microscopic study carried out on rat lung was that the evidence for existence of a continuous epithelial lining or of alveolar lining plaques was lacking. Since that time electron microscopic studies have
Footnotes
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Read before the Section on Diseases of the Chest at the 112th Annual Meeting of the American Medical Association, Atlantic City, NJ, June 17, 1963.
