A couple more human blood photos.

[Crater Eddie]

Above: A field of human red cells with a few white cells (nuclei stained blue) interspersed. Also several platelets (the small blue specs).






The white cell with the red stained granules is an eosinophil.


It finally occurred to me to put a drop of glycerin on the slide and apply a cover glass, more or less simulating the oil immersion effect without the mess. Of course this work is done with w 40x dry objective.

[gekko]

CE, very nice! The 2nd image is excellent! The first might have been improved (and I'm guessing here) by opening up the condenser aperture somewhat.

[Crater Eddie]

Thanks Gekko. You are probably right about opening up the aperture, that is difficult for me to judge.
I think I have finally gotten the hang of this stain. It has taken a lot of trial and error, but it finally looks pretty much the way it should.
CE

[Crater Eddie]

For visual work I just use the slide dry with no cover glass, I can see what I want to see fine that way. But for photographs, that results in too many diffraction artifacts, especially with these Acromat objectives. One of these days I'll find some Apos, and we will see how much difference that makes. The glycerin and cover glass is a pretty good compromise between the dry slide and the oil immersion objective; I get a decent image without the mess of the immersion oil. I wonder about clear nail polish. Could that be used to make a permanent mount? Or would the solvents leach out the stain? Hmmm...

CE

[Peter]

Hi Crater Eddie,
Why not just use Canada balsam for making permanent mounts?
Peter.

[Crater Eddie]

I don't happen to have any on hand, Peter, or I would. I'll put some on my "to order" list.
CE

[vasselle]

Bonjour
La deuxième photo est très bonne.
Cordialement seb

[Crater Eddie]

Thank you!

And, as expected, the clear nail polish is not suitable, as it caused much of the stain to migrate to the edges of the cover slip. It was quite interesting to watch.
Also, the glycerin is having a similar effect, though not as pronounced and in much slower motion.
CE

[mrsonchus]

Thank you!

And, as expected, the clear nail polish is not suitable, as it caused much of the stain to migrate to the edges of the cover slip. It was quite interesting to watch.
Also, the glycerin is having a similar effect, though not as pronounced and in much slower motion.
CE

These are really good - the staining effects are fascinating. I've had some good results (not with blood though) with PVA and also surprisingly (because it's so cheap and easy) with Fructose. They are both water miscible and may have less of a solvent effect on the stains? Just guessing but worth a try. The Fructose gives a very clear and clean mount in my limited experience.

John

[Crater Eddie]

Thanks John. It has been interesting getting this stain to work properly, that is getting it to provide results similar to what I was accustomed to seeing in the lab.
I hadn't really thought much about making permanent mounts at all until I started playing around with this bottle of glycerin... that started the wheels turning. I haven't made permanent mounts since high school, and that was more years ago than I care to contemplate.
I have read a little about using fructose, I'll have to look into that some more. Thanks for the reminder.
CE