stain vascular tissue?

[sjohnson]

can anybody suggest a stain for xylem &/or phloem of 'live' plant material?

sandra

[David W. Kramer]

Phloroglucinol can be used to stain lignified cells (xylem). Make up
a solution:

EtOH, 95% 100 ml
HCl (conc) 16 ml
Phloroglucinol 0.1 g

Place a drop of phloroglucinol solution onto the tissue (thin
section) and incubate 30-60 min. [temperature is not indicated!]

Result: Lignified cell walls stain red. Because the dye fades in a
short time, the preparation is not permanent.

This is taken directly from page 149 of Ruzin, Steven E. 1999.
Plant Microtechnique and Microscopy. New York: Oxford University
Press

>can anybody suggest a stain for xylem &/or phloem of 'live' plant material?
>
>sandra
>
>

>_______________________________________________
>Plant-ed mailing list
>Plan...@net.bio.net
>http://www.bio.net/biomail/listinfo/plant-ed

--
*********************
David W. Kramer, Ph.D.
Asst. Prof. of Evolution, Ecology, and Organismal Biology
Ohio State University at Mansfield
1680 University Drive
Mansfield, OH 44906-1547
Phone: (419) 755-4344 FAX: (419) 755-4367
e-mail: kram...@osu.edu
http://www.mansfield.ohio-state.edu/~dkramer/

[Jensen, Douglas]

Toluidine blue also works for lignified and suberized tissues, and it's
safer than phloroglucinol. I have never mixed it up, so I don't know
the recipe, but I've seen references to 0.1% and 0.05%.

I still prefer phloroglucinol myself, but that may be because I like the
red color.

________________________________
Douglas P. Jensen
Chair of Biology
Converse College
Spartanburg, South Carolina, 29302
douglas...@converse.edu
(864)596-9123

[Wilson A. Taylor]

At 04:55 PM 2/7/2007, you wrote:
>Toluidine blue also works for lignified and suberized tissues, and it's
>safer than phloroglucinol. I have never mixed it up, so I don't know
>the recipe, but I've seen references to 0.1% and 0.05%.

I got a recipe from Sue Schenk years ago that calls for 0.2% in
distilled water. It works pretty well, though lightly lignified
thickenings do not stain a particularly dark blue green (in contrast
to the blue-purple of unlignified cell walls), which may not be
surprising. I also tried a buffered formulation that I got from some
other source and it was more of a pain to mix and seemed to give no
better results.

I have seen the damage to stages and objectives due to proximity to
the HCl in the standard phloroglucinol formulation and it is not pretty.

Wil Taylor