bone saws

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From:Barry Rittman <brittman@mail.db.uth.tmc.edu>
To:histology <histonet@pathology.swmed.edu>
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Deb,
There have been several excellent suggestions concerning your request
but it was not clear to me from your email why you wished to slice the
bone.
Do you need to just cut the bones in half to allow for better fixation
or do you need to cut at a specific angle to examine the bone shaft? Are
you talking about cutting slices of bone for sections? Are you studying
Haversian systems, canaliculi etc?
Whichever system you use you will of course damage the soft tissue.
For controlled slicing of bone to produce sections the Silverstone
Taylor machine using an air turbine motor and a diamond impregnated
metal disc is probably the best (cannot remember where this came from
but can find out).
For slicing bones in half, the best system we have found is the Ma-Med
diamond band saw  (from Columbia Medical) . This is essentially a
miniature band saw using a thin metal blade that is impregnated with
diamond.
Both systems use copious amounts of water during the sectioning.
hope this helps
Barry




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