Sample prep tips for 3D confocal of pollen

Posted by cromey on
URL: http://confocal-microscopy-list.275.s1.nabble.com/Sample-prep-tips-for-3D-confocal-of-pollen-tp2118618.html

I have very close to zero experience prepping plant tissues for any type of microscopy.  I’ve been contacted by a botanist that is interested in looking at a variety of pollen types and he’s never done confocal.  He’d like to look at the 3D structures and it sounds like good 3D may very well be important.

 

I know from limited experience that the far side of a pollen grain often doesn’t look as good in a 3D rendering, presumably due to spherical aberration, scattering, and other optical effects.  I gather from the resources I have that pollen is highly autofluorescent across the entire VIS spectrum (probably why the vendors love to use it for demos).

 

Any tips, suggested review articles, web sites, etc that people could point me to for sample prep techniques?  Any microscopy caveats to be aware of?

 

Many thanks.

Doug

 

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Douglas W. Cromey, M.S. - Assistant Scientific Investigator

Dept. of Cell Biology & Anatomy, University of Arizona

1501 N. Campbell Ave, Tucson, AZ  85724-5044 USA

 

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