[Malignant tumors of the uterus characterized by endocrine differentiation]

Widely varying numbers of endocrine cells were identified in 12 out of 64 cases of uterine cancer in the course of histochemical and electron microscopic examination. Some neoplasms had morphologic features of apudoma of various degree of differentiation, the remaining ones (adenocarcinoma and adenosquamous carcinoma) were identified as tumors of endocrine origin if their cells contained certain specific metabolites most reliably detectable by the argyrophilic method after Grimelius and electron microscopy. The results of the study and literature data suggest that both endocrine and epithelial cells originate from multipotential epithelial stem cells.