I hadn't thought to ask this question myself, but got caught up in curiosity
once I saw it posed:  but does it make a difference if this is with respect
to fresh frozen (as opposed to paraffin-embedded) tissue (& at fairly low
temp [32 degrees C])?  (I always thought it had to do with uniformity of the
time it took for the sx's to dry, since ambient conditions fluctuate.)
Susan Bachus
----- Original Message -----
From: "J. A. Kiernan" 
To: "P. Emry" 
Cc: 
Sent: Friday, May 10, 2002 1:25 AM
Subject: Re: drying slides?


> On Thu, 9 May 2002, P. Emry wrote:
> > I let my slides air dry rather than putting them on a warmer.
> > Is there some benefit to warmer-drying over air?
>
> IMHO No.  Rapid drying undissolves air from the film
> of water under the sections, and the resulting
> minibubbbles (easily seen at low magnification under
> the sections on the dried slides) result in bumpy
> and detached sections. For disastrous slides, dry them
> above the melting point of the wax. Melting the wax
> is OK only AFTER all the water beneath the sections
> has gone.
>
> I've never used a slide-dryer that evaporates water with
> the slides in a vertical plane. Universities can't afford
> such things. The principle is good, and people fortunate
> enough to have such equipment tell me that it works well.
>
> If you're stuck with hotplates, keep one at 40C for
> drying before staining, and one at 45C for stained
> and coverslipped sections.
> ----------------------------------------
> John A. Kiernan
> Department of Anatomy & Cell Biology
> The University of Western Ontario
> London,  Canada   N6A 5C1
>    kiernan@uwo.ca
>    http://publish.uwo.ca/~jkiernan
>
>
>