The Nikon MicroscopyU confocal microscopy image gallery was created with a PCM-2000 confocal scanning system interfaced to a Nikon Eclipse E600 upright microscope. Images were recorded in successive z-axis serial sections with C-Imaging Systems software with excitation illumination provided by an argon-ion and/or a helium-neon laser.

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As advances in medicine extend life and man has altered his environment by releasing synthesized "wonder" chemicals such as polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) and chlorofluorocarbons like the refrigerant freon, cancer has become a familiar scourge. Lung cancer, the second most common type, is the leading cause of cancer death (157,400 expected deaths in the United States in 2001), with nearly 90 percent of the cases due to cigarette smoking. But not all cancer cells are terrible.

Tissue culturists have capitalized on the properties of cancer cells to multiply rapidly and resist destruction. Patented "designer" clones, created with features such as expressing xenobiotic metabolizing enzymes or factor-dependent replication, abound in the cell line catalogues. In fact, some companies have parlayed their patented lung cancer tissue lines into booming businesses, if the vendor numbers peddling on the World Wide Web are any indication. Human adenocarcinoma of the lung, initiated from a human alveolar cell carcinoma (tumor), is a preferred type for cancer research as well as for genetic and biochemical investigations.

Lung cancers are divided into small-cell and non-small cell types including adenocarcinoma (cancers of secretory organ linings); each with its own treatment regime. Differentiation between lung adenocarcinoma and pleura mesothelioma of biopsied tumors is by visible discrimination under the microscope, but newer automatic discrimination techniques using powerful computers and neural networks show real promise. Early screening of patients using a chest x-ray or lung biopsy often leads to successful treatments.

Lung cancer is the end-stage of a multi-step carcinogenesis, which starts with a change in the DNA of an alveolar cell. The cancerous cell starts to replicate and spread. Cancer cells are first found in coughed-up mucous, but no tumor can be detected. In the next stage, cancer cells are found in a few layers of lung cells but have not grown to the outer lung surface. Then, the cancer is restricted to the lung and surrounded by healthy tissue, leading to it spreading to the lymph nodes. From there, the cancer spreads to other parts of the body (metastasizes). Treatments include surgical removal, chemotherapy, and/or radiation therapy. In more extreme cases, lung transplants are performed and gene therapy shows much promise.