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TECHNIQUE 49<br />

Allen's, modification of Bouin's (Seyfert, 1927; Evans, 1933, 1937), and<br />

Nawaschin's (D. T. Wang, 1934; Western, 1936 b) fixatives have been used for<br />

smuts. A method for demonstrating nuclei in the promycelium first used by<br />

Kniep (1921) has been adopted with only slight modifications. The following<br />

details are taken from Hanna (1929). A thin film of 1 per cent, malt agar is<br />

spread over a sHde and spores are dusted on the surface with a camel's-hair brush.<br />

The slides are inverted over glass rods in a Petri dish containing a few drops of<br />

distilled water. At the desired stage of germination the material is fixed in<br />

Flemming's weaker fluid (15 minutes). The fixative is removed by adding a few<br />

drops of distilled water and sucking up the excess liquid with filter-paper. To<br />

avoid washing off the spores during staining the sHdes are passed through a bath<br />

of ether and then into a 0-2 per cent, solution of collodion made up with equal<br />

parts of alcohol and ether. Others (Harper, 1899) have germiaated the spores in<br />

beerwort in a watch glass, and used egg albumen to fix them to the shde. The<br />

liquid, which should be turbid with germinating spores, is taken up in a fine<br />

capillary tube and discharged into a larger droplet of the fixative. The spores<br />

settle on the film of egg albumen, and the hquid is allowed to evaporate, but not<br />

to dry out completely, before the shde is passed on to the alcohols. The fixative<br />

is not washed out.<br />

For a study of the cytoplasm D. T. Wang (1934) found the best fixative was<br />

le Regaud, consisting of 3 per cent, potassium bichromate (four parts) and 40 per<br />

cent, commercial formalin (one part).<br />

STAINS<br />

Harper (1899) used the triple stain^ for nuclei in the promycehum, but<br />

found a 1 per cent, solution of methyl green better for staining nuclei in spores<br />

already in possession of a thick wall. Most workers since Harper have used<br />

Heidenhain's haematoxylon. No recognized technique exists for treating the<br />

nuclei of smuts with a quick-acting fixative followed immediately by acetocarmine<br />

or similar dye, as in the method used for pollen and macerated tissue. In<br />

preliminary tests at Aberystwyth dividing nuclei in the promycelia of U. hordei<br />

were stained red by lacmoid,^ and this type of reagent deserves further trial for<br />

the nuclei of smuts.<br />

Metachromatic granules in the vacuome have been demonstrated by means of'<br />

neutral red, cresyl blue, and Delafield's haematoxylon. AniUne fuchsin, with a<br />

counter-stain of light green, stained the chondriosomes bright red in material<br />

fixed in Meves reagent (Yen, 1937).<br />

For detailed observations on parasitic mycelium sections of plant tissue<br />

should be 3-5 /x. Triple and Heidenhain's were used by Blizzard (1926), safranin<br />

and fast green by Evans (1933) for Urocystis cepulae, thionin and orange G for<br />

Ustilago may Ms by Walters (1934).<br />

The general distribution of mycelium in the host can be demonstrated in hand<br />

sections of material fixed in 70 per cent, alcohol and stained by lactophenol<br />

cotton blue or in microtome sections, 10-12 /^t, by aniline gentian violet wjth a<br />

counter-stain of Bismarck brown. Take the slides from 70 per cent, alcohol and<br />

^ For stains and fixatives see Plant Microtechnique, Johansen. McGraw-Hill, 1940.<br />

^ See The Handling o/ Chromosomes, C. D. Darlington & L. F. La Cour. Allen and Unwin,<br />

1942. 165 pp.<br />

D

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