RE: [Histonet] Cutting paraffin sections in a warm room

[gayle callis]

Adam, 

Cool trimmed bone blocks on a block of ice with extra water on top of ice.
This helps soften the bone and keepS the block cold but don't over soak,
that can lead to shredded sections.   A cube of ice wrapped in gauze, held
to face of block and also held to knife holder may help or simply keep a wad
of gauze on the ice block, and hold to block face just before continuing to
section a block. We even put the forceps used to grasp ribbon cold in an ice
bath, prevents sticking paraffin and keep the microtome blade holder (metal
plate) clean - paraffin likes to stick to everything, even itself.

We also infiltrate and embed bone in a harder paraffin (Tissue Prep 2) to
match the harder matrix of decalcified bone to paraffin.   

There have been times when our lab was stifling, and cooling the trimmed
block on ice block solved the problem.  

Gayle M. Callis
HTL/HT/MT(ASCP) 



-Original Message-
From: histonet-boun...@lists.utsouthwestern.edu
[mailto:histonet-boun...@lists.utsouthwestern.edu] On Behalf Of Adam .
Sent: Thursday, November 05, 2009 11:11 AM
To: histonet@lists.utsouthwestern.edu
Subject: [Histonet] Cutting paraffin sections in a warm room

Hi all,

I've just recently started cutting paraffin sections (of bones). A few weeks
ago, the facilities people decided that it was fall and now the lab is
significantly warmer than it used to be, and my paraffin is falling apart
and sticking to everything. Apparently, we can't control the temperature
through a thermostat at all, and the microtome is inside the lab. I was
wondering if anyone had any ideas on how to section in a warm room.

Thanks,
Adam

 

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Re: [Histonet] Cutting paraffin sections in a warm room

[louise renton]

One of the little things I learned along the way regarding bone sectioning:
if time allows, trim (face) the blocks and leave them in the deep freeze
(-?20) overnight. T
Then when you are ready to section, take ONE block out at a time and place
on ice. this trick is especially useful for us as we cut 50 serial sections
at one go. The block is usually cold enough to get at least 40 sections off
it before recooling.
BTW, we use the deepe embedding moulds, about 1cm deep, so if you are using
the flatter mouds, maybe overnight is not necessary

my 2c worth

have a great weekend!

On Thu, Nov 5, 2009 at 8:10 PM, Adam . anonwu...@gmail.com wrote:

 Hi all,

 I've just recently started cutting paraffin sections (of bones). A few
 weeks
 ago, the facilities people decided that it was fall and now the lab is
 significantly warmer than it used to be, and my paraffin is falling apart
 and sticking to everything. Apparently, we can't control the temperature
 through a thermostat at all, and the microtome is inside the lab. I was
 wondering if anyone had any ideas on how to section in a warm room.

 Thanks,
 Adam
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-- 
Louise Renton
Bone Research Unit
University of the Witwatersrand
Johannesburg
South Africa
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However, many electrons were terribly inconvenienced.
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