[Thermogenesis of mammary epitheliomas. III. Study, by means of fluvography, of the termal conductivity of mammary tissue and of the influence of tumor vascularization]

Abstract

The effective thermal conductivity of different "in vivo" and excised breast tissues and the specific heat power of a series of 24 breast carcinomas have been measured "in situ" by means of intratissular thermometric and fluvographic needle probes, and using a mathematical model operated with a computer. The thermal conductivity which depends directly on the capillary blood flow is higher within irrigated tissues than in the excised ones and demonstrates significant changes according to the adipose, fibrous or glandular structure of the breast; furthermore, it is much higher within cancerous tissues, more especially in the surroundings of the tumour. The heat power changes largely from one cancer to another and may reach values higher than those measured on the most thermogenic normal tissues. At hand of comparison with thermography, radiography and arteriography, these results are discussed from the three following points of view: a) the vascularisation of cancers and the shell model of tumour growth; b) the distribution of arterial, venous and tumour temperatures and the origin of the cancerous heat; c) the heat transfer from cancer to skin and the formation of the malignant cutaneous thermal pattern pictured by thermography.