Modification of a technique for support of thin, flexible tissues for microscopic examination: application to turkey air sac membranes.

Modifications to the ring-stabilization technique for collection of avian air sac membranes were developed to allow dehydration and paraffin embedding of samples to be done by an automated system and to simplify processing for transmission electron microscopy (TEM). The modified collection method utilized a pair of rings that were snapped together across an intervening membrane sample. The tissue and ring ensemble was embedded as a unit. Paraffin-embedded tissues were collected with aluminum rings, whereas samples for TEM were collected with rings made of polymerized embedding medium. Tissue sections of excellent quality were obtained with the method. The technique is shown to be applicable to immunohistochemical studies.