method for staining of invisible cell pellets? - (Aug/16/2006 )
Hi guys!
I'm working with dendritic cells and currently perform some crawl-out assays from murine skin sections. The cell numbers of this assay are so very small that I can't see a pellet after centrifugation and I'm afraid of loosing cells during discarding the supernatant. Is there a suitable method of staining the cells so that I can see a pellet - would methylene blue work? The cells don't have to be alive after this it's just to count the cells. But I need to see them in order to know if I loose half of them.
Cheers,
Holger
-hopfl-
QUOTE (hopfl @ Aug 16 2006, 01:42 PM)
Hi guys!
I'm working with dendritic cells and currently perform some crawl-out assays from murine skin sections. The cell numbers of this assay are so very small that I can't see a pellet after centrifugation and I'm afraid of loosing cells during discarding the supernatant. Is there a suitable method of staining the cells so that I can see a pellet - would methylene blue work? The cells don't have to be alive after this it's just to count the cells. But I need to see them in order to know if I loose half of them.
Cheers,
Holger
I'm working with dendritic cells and currently perform some crawl-out assays from murine skin sections. The cell numbers of this assay are so very small that I can't see a pellet after centrifugation and I'm afraid of loosing cells during discarding the supernatant. Is there a suitable method of staining the cells so that I can see a pellet - would methylene blue work? The cells don't have to be alive after this it's just to count the cells. But I need to see them in order to know if I loose half of them.
Cheers,
Holger
I centrifuge my samples in a way that the tubes are always with lid hinge on the outer side, then I know where the pellet is or should be. And if the amount is too low, later when the the following steps (whatever) work you know that everything is ok.
-hobglobin-