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Bill,
Fill a (5-10ml) syringe with Vaseline.  Cut off the sharpended end of a
needle with a fine-toothed saw.  If you use a clipper of some sort, it will
crush the needle closed.  The the bigger the needle gauge, the bigger the
bead.  Squeeze a bead of goo around the perimeter of the coverslip, invert
the slide over it and set it in place.  Adjusting the height of the
coverslip is simply a matter of pressing on it more or less.
Carl

Carl A. Boswell
Dept. of Mol. Cell. Biology
Univ. of Arizona
(520) 626-8469
(520) 626-8469
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----- Original Message -----
From: "Bill Christens-Barry" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Wednesday, December 11, 2002 12:43 PM
Subject: sealing slides?


> Search the CONFOCAL archive at
> http://listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu/cgi-bin/wa?S1=confocal
>
> I'm looking for a better way to mount wool fibers for confocal work,
> and am hoping someone here can help me improve this situation.
>
> Currently, I'm using 25 mm wide slides with 22 mm wide cover slips,
> together with Immersol. I place a fiber on the slide, add a drop of
> Immersol, lay down a cover slip, and attempt to seal the whole thing
> using nail polish.
>
> What I find is that the sealing is pretty ineffective and messy. I
> tend to get big globs of nail polish in some places while failing to
> get a good seal all of the way around the perimeter of the cover
> slip. Good permanent sealing is essential for me, because I'll want
> to reuse these slides over the next year.
>
> What other sealing techniques might be available for this? I am
> preparing these slides infrequently and in small numbers (5 - 10 at a
> time, every few months), and for other reasons cover slipping must be
> done by hand. My first thought is to use wax or parafilm in some way.
> Are there standard sealing techniques or tools for applying a nice
> bead of liquid paraffin all of the way around the perimeter of a
> cover slip? Are there wicking problems using liquified wax? What
> about using a parafilm gasket that could be heat sealed - is this
> something that people have worked out? Have IR light sources been
> used to temporarily (and locally) melt parafilm? I would like to
> avoid heating the whole slide .
>
> Finally, can anyone suggest online or printed literature discussing
> cover slipping techniques?
>
> Thanks.
>
> Bill Christens-Barry
> -----------------------
> Bill Christens-Barry, PhD
> Equipoise Imaging, LLC
> [log in to unmask]
> 410-750-9017