Feline vaccine-associated fibrosarcoma: an ultrastructural study of 20 tumors (1996-1999)

Twenty feline vaccine-associated sarcomas were examined by transmission electron microscopy. Tumors contained pleomorphic spindle cells, histiocytoid cells, and giant cells. Most tumors contained myofibroblasts, which had morphologic features similar to those of fibroblasts. These cells were further distinguished by subplasmalemmal dense plaques and thin cytoplasmic actin myofilaments organized as elongated bundles concentrated at irregular intervals forming characteristic dense bodies. Intracellular crystalline particulate material was found in 5 of the 20 tumors. Energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy was used to identify the crystalline material within one tumor as aluminum-based. One tumor from a feline leukemia virus-infected cat contained budding and immature retroviral particles.