[Coral-List] Optimal fixatives for coral tissues??
Shelley Anthony
s.anthony at gbrmpa.gov.au
Mon Jan 12 19:06:09 EST 2004
Dear Coral-Listers,
I would very much like to hear from scientists who are dealing with
different fixation techniques for histological work on hard corals. I
have been using standard 5% seawater-buffered formalin, per
recommendation from my supervisor. However, I have had numerous
conflicting suggestions from histologists, lab technicians and other
sources that the following fixatives give better results: 4% formalin,
10% formalin, 70% ethanol, and 73% ethanol, glutaraldehyde, Helley's
fixative, etc. (However, most of these people were not necessarily
working on corals.) The publications I have read also do not seem to
have a standard procedure, or the fixative may be dependent on the
intended usage.
My questions are: Is there an optimal fixative specifically for
hard corals that can be used for several different kinds of
histological/histopathological/microscopic procedures? What kind of
results have you gotten when using different fixatives? I would
appreciate any information you can share. Please reply directly to my
email address. Thanks!
Cheers,
Shelley
--
Shelley L. Anthony <shelleya at gbrmpa.gov.au>
PhD Student, CRC Reef Research Center
School of Marine Biology & Aquaculture
James Cook University
Townsville, QLD 4811 AUSTRALIA
ReefHQ/GBRMPA
Townsville, QLD 4810 AUSTRALIA
(07)4750-0898
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