Have you ever wondered how scientists are able to look at cells under a microscope? One way is to use a special machine called a cryostat, which cuts pieces of brain or muscle into super-thin slices. (Jake recently wrote a post about another way to study cells, here.) If you’ve ever watched someone use a deli slicer, you already know how a cryostat works! As I turn a wheel with one hand, the machine pushes the tissue sample closer to a small blade, and the blade very precisely slices through the tissue.
What makes the cryostat special is that it works at really cold temperatures (0⁰ F, the same temperature as the inside of your freezer!), and it cuts frozen tissues into little pieces that we call sections. Each section of a tissue is so thin that, if you stacked five of them, they would be as thick as a strand of human hair! After we cut each section we put it on a microscope slide, and then we can look at the lizard’s cells under a microscope. We have to work very carefully, and sometimes it can take over an hour to cut through a single lizard’s brain!
Using the cryostat takes up a big chunk of my time, and I like to listen to music while I work. This keeps me happy and energized.
Although using the cryostat is sometimes hard and it takes a lot of time to use it carefully, it is an important part of my research. I am looking forward to looking at brain cells under the microscope soon!
A Summer of Science: The colorful side of research! | Lizards & Friends
Jul 11, 2016 -
[…] we cut pieces of brain and muscle tissue into tiny pieces, and then put them on microscope slides (click here to read that post). The next step in my work is to stain those microscope slides so the tissues are visible to us. If […]
A Summer of Science: Meet Riann, our high school intern | Lizards & Friends
Aug 15, 2016 -
[…] we made chemical solutions used in staining microscope slides. I was able to work with Miguel on sectioning lizard tissues and staining […]