Greetings,
          Padraig Corley wrote:

>a little while back it was suggested that by saturating tissue culture media
>with vitamin E one could prevent the formation of autofluorescent
>lipofuscins.
>I am culturing human T-cells , and unfortunatly they seem to exhibit high
>autofluorescence at all wavelegnths. Since I also observe this in unfixed
>samples, I am beginning to think that the afore mentioned lipofuscins
>may be the culprit.
>Could someone please let me know if d-alpha-tocopherol acetate, T1157
>is a suitable supplement. (SIGMA, '96) Also how many units is it
>advisable to use? i.e.  units/ml final conc. needed/suggested.
>
        I don't know about the specific application, but some years ago I
used a water soluble derivative of vitamin E called "Trolox". This is
indeed a very powerful antioxidant and is several orders of mag more
soluble than vitamin E. As far as I know, Fluka sells the stuff, although
maybe other places do to. I have no fincancial stake in Trolox, it just
worked for us (not in minimizing autofluorescence, just as a nice strong
aqueous antioxidant).
        Hope this is of use,
                                Tobias Baskin

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