[Histonet] RE: IHC on plastic sections

[gayle callis]

You did not say WHICH plastic?     

 

Immunostaining on tissues embedded in methyl methacrylate are successful
since one can totally remove this plastic from the tissue with various
solvents.  There may be some stringent antigen retrieval needed .  Neil Hand
had a panel of over 200 antibodies with successful staining of tissue
embedded in MMA, and retrieval with a HIER pressure cooker system, a
published method in Journal of Histotechnology.  Neil Hand has written a
chapter on plastics and how to do the IHC in Gamble and Bancroft's Theory
and Practice of Histological Techniques, both 5th and 6th editions.  

 

  If the plastic is glycol methacrylate, then it is less successful to no
staining, since this plastic, once polymerized,  cannot be removed or
dissolved away with a solvent.   The large immunoglobulins (antibodies)
cannot penetrate the plastic matrix to get to antigen very well.  There are
publications where people has some success with GMA but most people don't
succeed.  EM resins can be etched with sodium ethoxide, and other chemical
methods, but there are attendant problems with these methods.   

 

Gayle M. Callis

HTL/HT/MT()ASCP)

Bozeman MT