Sansevieria plant: Cross sections in Etzold FCA stain

[MicroBob]

Hi together,
recently I spend some time on making plant sections and on the design of a blade holder for the hand/cylinder microtome.
Here I show how I made sections from Sansevieria stems.

The stem was clamped with a piece of carrot. The sections were cut as thin as possible, maybe 70µ or so. They were brought into 70% Ethanol, then AFE solution for 20 minutes. Then washed in dem. water. Next 1/2 hour in Etzold FCA solution. Washed in isopropanol several times. Then put on the slide and on top a drop of Euparal. Then application of vacuum with a hand pump. Some more Euparal and a small round cover slip.

Bob

[desertrat]

Those are great looking sections!

Several years ago I bought a small bottle of Euparal and Euparal Essence from a company in Southern California that sells entomology supplies, Bioquip. Recently I noticed they no longer sell Euparal products, saying the company owner has retired and these products are no longer available.

Some Googling revealed the Carl Roth AG in Germany makes these products, but I would most likely not be able to buy from them.

There are a few types of specimens that do not pass well into clearing agents to be mounted in balsam, but for those that do I can use the balsam I have on hand.

There are some century old methods for going from alcohol to Venice Turpentine, I may try that someday.

[Hobbyst46]

Beautiful preparations, Bob. What are the indigo-colored spots?

[mrsonchus]

Lovely sections, great clarity & colours. The purple seems to have stained fibers and maybe the cuticle also? I wonder if the more regularly-spaced peripheral purple-stained areas (in the cortex) are ducts? Does this plant 'bleed' any liquid/s when cut fresh?

What lovely hand-sections, thanks for posting.

John B.

[MicroBob]

Hi together,
a description of the FCA stain and it's interpretation can be found in german in the "Mikrofibel", written by Klaus Henkel:https://www.mikroskopie-forum.de/pdf/mikrofibel.pdf on page 187. The Mikrofibel is a microscopy handbook written from the perspective of the knowledgable amateur, published in 2003, unforunately never continued or updated. Many important microscope basics are explained very well. It is a lot of difficult stuff to read and tends lead newbies away from doing active microscopy, but I have never found an error in the text.

FCA comes from Fuchsin-Chryosidin-Astrablau and it is a differentiating quick stain. For specific differentiation it can be necessary to vary the staining process: Hot, warm or cold - short or long - differntiating with ethanol afterwards.

If you like stained plant sections you might have a look at the pages of the Mikroskopie Kolleg Bonn:
http://www.mikroskopie-bonn.de/themenga ... .html#a972
They also have detailed descriptions how to make them:
http://www.mikroskopie-bonn.de/biblioth ... /160.html#
http://www.mikroskopie-bonn.de/biblioth ... k/282.html

@Doron: Which spots do you mean?
@John: The puple will be wooden material surrounding a duct. I have added another image that shows the structure better.
Here is a good (german) description of the different areas in the sections with example pictures. I couldn't translate it:http://www.mikroskopie-bonn.de/biblioth ... k/158.html

Bob

[mrsonchus]

That's better!
Not ducts but fiber-bundles. The plant's equivalent of reinforcing-rods...

Lovely images.

Thanks, John B.

[Hobbyst46]

Thanks Bob, the last response answers my question.