Background: For decades, the Vibratome served as a standard laboratory resource for sectioning fresh and fixed tissues. In skilled hands, high quality and consistent fresh unfixed tissue sections can be produced using a Vibratome but the sectioning procedure is extremely time consuming. In this study, we conducted a systematic comparison between the Vibratome and a new approach to section fresh unfixed tissues using a Compresstome. We used a Vibratome and a Compresstome to cut fresh unfixed lymphoid and genital non-human primate tissues then used in situ tetramer staining to label virus-specific CD8 T cells and immunofluorescent counter-staining to label B and T cells. We compared the Vibratome and Compresstome in five different sectioning parameters: speed of cutting, chilling capability, specimen stabilization, size of section, and section/staining quality. Results: Overall, the Compresstome and Vibratome both produced high quality sections from unfixed spleen, lymph node, vagina, cervix, and uterus, and subsequent immunofluorescent staining was equivalent. The Compresstome however, offered distinct advantages; producing sections approximately 5 times faster than the Vibratome, cutting tissue sections more easily, and allowing production of larger sections. Conclusions: A Compresstome can be used to generate fresh unfixed primate lymph node, spleen, vagina, cervix and uterus sections, and is superior to a Vibratome in cutting these fresh tissues.
CITATION STYLE
Abdelaal, H. M., Kim, H. O., Wagstaff, R., Sawahata, R., Southern, P. J., & Skinner, P. J. (2015). Comparison of Vibratome and Compresstome sectioning of fresh primate lymphoid and genital tissues for in situ MHC-tetramer and immunofluorescence staining. Biological Procedures Online, 17(1). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12575-014-0012-4
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