From: "J. A. Kiernan" <jkiernan@julian.uwo.ca>
To: "Jennings, Margaret A." <jennings@mayo.edu>


> On Fri, 25 Aug 2000, Jennings, Margaret A. wrote:
>
>
> > If I start with a tissue a microns x  b microns x c
> > microns what do I end up with? Is there a time factor for additional
shrink?
>
>   The only way to know the amount of shrinkage is to measure the fresh
>   specimen and its equivalent dimensions in the stained and mounted
>   sections.
>

It is well to keep in mind that overall shrinkage is only half the story.
Microscopic examination of stained sections shows considerable shrinkage at
the cellular level.  Cells and fibres that are contiguous in life will have
spaces between them.  While these spaces between cells are quite small, when
summed they can account for a considerable change in volume.  This volume
change does not show up simply by measuring overall dimension changes of the
lump of tissue, and results in significant underestimation of total
shrinkage.

Bryan Llewellyn