Morphological changes of the basement membrane associated with endothelial proliferation in astrocytic tumors are studied in this report. Laminin is known to be a specific glycoprotein of basement membranes. We applied this characteristic of laminin to enable us to observe various characteristics of the basement membrane. The presence of laminin in 13 glioblastomas, 15 anaplastic astrocytomas, 7 astrocytomas, and 6 pilocytic astrocytomas was examined by peroxidase-antiperoxidase (PAP) staining of formalin-fixed and paraffin-embedded surgical specimens. White matter from five normal cerebral hemispheres obtained during autopsy and subsequently embedded using the same method, were used as a control. Laminin was observed at the glioma-mesenchymal junction in astrocytic tumors, and the deposits of laminin made the tumor vasculature come into intense relief. The destructive changes of the basement membrane, including disruption, thickening, disconnection, dissociation, winding, and conjunction, became greater with progressive endothelial proliferation in astrocytic tumors. Those changes were seen to be most remarkable in glioblastoma. In addition, there was a marked variety of morphological change in the basement membrane in different areas of glioblastomas, although the changes were almost constant in other astrocytic tumors. We present a schematic hypothesis of the stages of angiogenesis in glioblastoma based on the above morphological changes of the basement membrane and discuss it in this report.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)