378 www.thelancet.com/oncology Vol 15 April 2014 tumour is malignant melanoma. Likewise, sentinel lymphadenectomy is not useful for staging disease in the management of atypical Spitz tumours because metastases from these tumours are not prognostic. The results of Lallas and colleagues’ study establish that sentinel lymph node metastasis is not of diagnostic or prognostic signifi cance in patie...

The Drosophila embryonic central nervous system (CNS) develops from sets of neuroblasts (NBs) which segregate from the ventral neuroectoderm during early embryogenesis. It is not well established how each individual NB in the neuroectoderm acquires its characteristic identity along the dorsal-ventral axis. Since it is known that CNS midline cells and spitz class genes (pointed, rhomboid, single...

The spitz class genes, pointed (pnt), rhomboid frho), single-minded (sim), spitz (spi)and Star (S), as well as the Drosophila epidermal growth factor receptor (Egfr) signaling genes, argos (aos), Egfr, orthodenticle (otd) and vein (vn), are required for the proper establishment of ventral neuroectodermal cell fate. The roles of the CNS midline cells, spitz class and Egfr signaling genes in cell...

In vertebrates and Drosophila, the Epidermal Growth Factor Receptor (EGFR) signal transduction pathway is important in the regulation of cellular development. EGFR is bound by several activating ligands including Transforming Growth Factor-α in vertebrates, and its homolog Spitz in Drosophila. It has been shown that Spitz and EGFR act in the development of the Drosophila central nervous system ...

BACKGROUND Differentiating Spitz nevi from melanoma can be difficult. Pagetoid spread of melanocytes is among the features making diagnosis difficult. Rare reports of isolated pagetoid Spitz nevi exist. OBSERVATIONS We present a unique case of multiple pagetoid Spitz nevi initially diagnosed as multiple in situ melanomas. Germline karyotyping, CDK4 and CDKN2A sequencing, and comparative genom...

Activation of the Drosophila EGF-receptor (DER) is spatially and temporally controlled by the release of its various ligands. DER and its ligand Spitz mediate the formation of specific somatic muscle precursors. We show that a second DER ligand, Vein, complements the activity of Spitz in the development of various somatic muscle precursors. In vn mutant embryos, the DER-dependent muscle precurs...

Blue nevus is a benign melanocytic lesion, typically asymptomatic and of unknown etiology. Many histological subtypes are recognized, the most commons being: common blue nevus, cellular blue nevus, and combined blue nevus. New rare variants have been described in the literature, with emphasis on eruptive blue nevus, plaque, agminate, linear, with satellitosis, disseminated, familial and targeto...