Andrew,
We orient tissue in CryoGel, which is a very viscous embedding medium. We
then snap freeze the tissue and gel simultaneously using the Gentle Jane.
The result is a snap frozen block. The tissue is  flat and uppermost in the
frozen block. The block can then be oriented in the microtome chuck and
sectioned
A pictorial description of the method can be seen on our web site
www.instrumedics.com
Click on "snap freezing" on the home page.
Bernice
schiller@2instrumedics.com