Lymph Node Blood Vessels: Exit Route for Systemic Dissemination of Cancer

Abstract

There are reports about the existence of meningeal lymphatic vessels in human and nonhuman primates (mormoset monkeys) and feasibility of noninvasively imaging and mapping them in vivo with high-resolution, clinical MRI. On T2-FLAIR and T1-weighted black-blood imaging, lymphatic vessels enhance with graduator, a gadolinium-based contrast agent with high propensity to extravasate across a permeable capillary endothelial barrier, but not with gadofosveset, a blood-pool contrast agent.