Sometimes you can get a decent section by pressing gauze soaked with decal
fluid on the face of the block for a couple of minutes (wear gloves), then
taking the first section off the face. Or you may get a few successive
sections by soaking the faced block in decal fluid for 15 to 30 minutes,
then chilling the block on the cold tray and cutting right off the face.
However, if you are going to be doing any substantial amount of work with
that block, probably the best approach is to reverse process it, decal it
properly, and reprocess it.  Remove the paraffin by soaking in xylene or
whatever clearing agent you use, remove the xylene with absolute alcohol,
bring the specimen down to water, then decal it, wash it and process it as
usual.  If you want you can place it in formalin overnight once it reaches
the water stage, to ensure the best possible fixation before decalcifying
it. Since most tissue processors won't run the stations in reverse order,
you'll probably have to do the reverse processing by hand, in a beaker or
flask. If the tissue was well fixed initially, it should withstand this
treatment with little if any noticeable harm.

Paul M.


> ----------
> From: 	histonet-bounces@lists.utsouthwestern.edu on behalf of
> Trisha Emry
> Sent: 	Friday, July 22, 2005 2:44 PM
> To: 	histo
> Subject: 	[Histonet] under decal
> 
> Is there anything that can be done for under decalcified bone after it has
> been processed?
> 
> Trisha
> Seattle
> 
> 
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> 

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