[Histonet] Coverslipping mystery

[Adam Boanas]

Hello,

We are having a problem that is developing into a big issue in our lab and I was wondering if anybody could shed any light on it. Our CV5000 coverslipper has recently started introducing microscopic air bubbles onto the slides during coverslipping. We have been told by our engineer that it is a consequence of the age and use of the motor and that sourcing another for an instrument that old (15yrs) will be v difficult. As such, we have been forced to manually coverslip using DPX and a pipette - manually applying the coverslips to the slide, thus mirroring the action of the coverslipper. This is fine at first and for the next few days the slides look great and very clean. However, after about day 4 -5 days post coverslipping, the slides develop an odd appearance down the microscope which looks like very fine `parched earth / crazy paving` all over the slide - including the section. The excess mountant around the edge of the coverslip also has a very faint, cloudy appearance when this occurs. This of course renders the slide un-useable. Does anyone have a clue what this might be down to / how we can stop it?
We are struggling for ideas with this one!  - this occurs with fresh DPX also.

Many thanks
Adam

Adam Boanas
Senior Research Associate
Epistem Ltd
48 Grafton Street
Manchester, M13 9XX