The aim of this study was to test the hypothesis that increased mechanical stress at the lateral borders of the area at risk may render this area more susceptible to ischaemia/reperfusion injury in the absence of collateral flow. The spatial distribution of myocardial necrosis within the territory of a transiently occluded left anterior descending coronary artery was investigated in 31 porcine hearts submitted to 48 min of coronary occlusion and 6 h of reperfusion. Immediately before excising the heart, the left anterior descending coronary artery was re-occluded and 10% fluorescein was injected in the left atrium. The area at risk was imaged by ultraviolet illumination of the myocardial slices, and the area of necrosis by incubation in triphenyltetrazolium chloride. The area at risk was divided in four sectors and an index of eccentricity was calculated as the percent of the area of necrosis located in the two lateral sectors of the area at risk. The area of contraction band necrosis was measured in whole heart histological sections. Infarcts were generally small, and were composed almost exclusively of contraction band necrosis. There was a good correlation between the extent of the area of contraction band necrosis and infarct size (r = 0.831, P < 0.0005). The area of necrosis had a patchy appearance and was predominantly distributed along the lateral borders of the area at risk. This eccentric distribution was more prominent in smaller infarcts, and the eccentricity index was inversely correlated with infarct size (r = -0.471, P = 0.007), suggesting that contraction band necrosis occurs first at the interface between control and reperfused myocardium in this model. These results are in agreement with a prominent role of mechanical factors in the genesis of myocardial necrosis during transient coronary occlusion.