Book dossier

Staining procedures used by the Biological stain commission

by H. J. Conn

The Biological Stain Commission (BSC) was founded by H.J. Conn to help microscopists assure the capability of stains and dyes to perform to expectations when used in a certain specified group of histolocal and pathological staining/dyeing methods. Thus, one can currently purchase quantities of a specific dye or stain from a vendor to color, for example, carbohydrates in a section of biological tissue. One of these samples may be certified to perform as expected in the coloring of carbohydrates and will show it by an applied label while the other sample - even though from the same lot - may lack the certification label and be, therefore, less costly but equally capable. The trick is to be able to search for a sample with a lot or batch number that has already been certified BUT lacks the label. For pathologists, the certification is generally worth the cost. This book was published to present to the interested user the staining procedures used by the BSC in the certification process. This book is worth while company for 'Conn's Biological Stains', a separate publication that deals exclusively with the nature of dyes and stains used in the biological/histological sciences. An example of the usefulness of knowledge of both the certification and use methods is the case of a dye called "Basic Fuchsin" (Color Index (CI): 42510 (Harleco Lot: 8242) and BSC Certification Number = LFG-56) which I use exclusively in a dye preparation called, 'Gomori's Aldehyde Fuchsin" for general coloring of tissue Elastin'. I have collected 4 x 100g bottles of this specific dye, because it provides a magnificent result for elastin in tissues. Using this preparation with H&E (hematoxylin and eosin - another standard pathologic and histologic dye prep) I can see almost every tissue component in well-differentiated color tones in a standard paraffin tissue section cut at normal thicknesses.