Currently, surgical management provides the definitive treatment of choice for most pituitary adenomas, craniopharyngiomas and meningiomas of the sellar region. The elegant minimally invasive transnasal endoscopic approach to the sella turcica and the anterior skull base has added a new dimension of versatility to pituitary surgery and can be adapted to many lesions in the region. In this multi-author book with numerous color illustrations the main aspects of the endonasal endoscopic approach to the skull base are presented, starting with a clear description of the endoscopic anatomy, the panoramic view afforded by the endoscope and the development of effective instruments and adjuncts. After the diagnostic studies, the strictly surgical features are considered in detail. The standard technique is described and particular aspects are treated, including the new extended approaches to the cavernous sinus, spheno-ethmoid planum and clival regions. The book stresses the importance of teamwork and has been produced by one of the pioneering groups in the field of endoscopic approaches to the pituitary. It is a useful guide primarily for neurosurgeons and sinonasal endoscopic surgeons but also for other specialists involved in the diagnosis and treatment of skull base lesions.
It is only recently that the use of the endoscope as the sole visualizing tool has been introduced in transsphenoidal pituitary surgery with its favorable related implications and minimal operative trauma. Of course, microscopic and endoscopic anatomy are basically the same, but the optical distorsion of endoscopic images is quite substantial compared to microscopic depictions. An endoscope lens produces images with maximal magnification at its center and severe contraction at its periphery. Nearer images are disproportionally enlarged and remote images are falsely miniaturized. This optical illusion may disorientate a surgeon who is not familiar with this peculiar condition at the skull base. This atlas acts as a guide through the endoscopic anatomy and gives detailed descriptions of the preoperative management and the surgical procedures.
It is only recently that the use of the endoscope as the sole visualizing tool has been introduced in transsphenoidal pituitary surgery with its favorable related implications and minimal operative trauma. Of course, microscopic and endoscopic anatomy are basically the same, but the optical distorsion of endoscopic images is quite substantial compared to microscopic depictions. An endoscope lens produces images with maximal magnification at its center and severe contraction at its periphery. Nearer images are disproportionally enlarged and remote images are falsely miniaturized. This optical illusion may disorientate a surgeon who is not familiar with this peculiar condition at the skull base. This atlas acts as a guide through the endoscopic anatomy and gives detailed descriptions of the preoperative management and the surgical procedures.
Along the undisturbed shores, especially of the Mediterranean Sea and the European North Atlantic Ocean, is a quite widespread plant called Beta maritima by botanists, or more commonly sea beet. Nothing, for the inexperienced observer's eye, distinguishes it from surrounding wild vegetation. Despite its inconspicuous and nearly invisible flowers, the plant has had and will have invaluable economic and scientific importance. Indeed, according to Linnè, it is considered "the progenitor of the beet crops possibly born from Beta maritima in some foreign country". Recent molecular research confirmed this lineage. Selection applied after domestication has created many cultivated types with different destinations. The wild plant always has been harvested and used both for food and as a medicinal herb. Sea beet crosses easily with the cultivated types. This facilitates the transmission of genetic traits lost during domestication, which selection processes aimed only at features immediately useful to farmers and consumers may have depleted. Indeed, as with several crop wild relatives, Beta maritima has been successfully used to improve cultivated beet’s genetic resistances against many diseases and pests. In fact, sugar beet cultivation currently would be impossible in many countries without the recovery of traits preserved in the wild germplasm. Dr. Enrico Biancardi graduated from Bologna University. From 1977 until 2009, he was involved in sugar beet breeding activity by the Istituto Sperimentale per le Colture Industriali (ISCI) formerly Stazione Sperimentale di Bieticoltura (Rovigo, Italy), where he released rhizomania and cercospora resistant germplasm and collected seeds of Mediterranean sea beet populations as a genetic resource for breeding and ex situ conservation. Retired since 2009, he still collaborates with several working breeders, in particular, at the USDA Agricultural Research Stations, at the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Science (CAAS), and at the Athens University (AUA). He has edited books, books chapters and authored more than 150 papers. Dr. Lee Panella is a plant breeder and geneticist with the USDA-ARS at Fort Collins, Colorado. He earned his B.S. in Crop and Soil Science from Michigan State University, an M.S. in Plant Breeding from Texas A&M University, and a Ph.D. in genetics from the University of California at Davis. His research focus is developing disease resistant germplasm using sugar beet wild relatives. He is chairman of the USDA-ARS Sugar Beet Crop Germplasm Committee and has collected and worked extensively with sea beet. Dr. Robert T. Lewellen was raised on a ranch in Eastern Oregon and obtained a B.S. in Crop Science from Oregon State University followed by a Ph.D. from Montana State University in Genetics. From 1966 to 2008 he was a research geneticist for the USDA-ARS at Salinas, California, where he studied the genetics of sugar beet and as a plant breeder, often used sea beet as a genetic source to produce many pest and disease resistant sugar beet germplasm and parental lines, while authoring more than 100 publications.
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