Histochemical identification of mast cells in the pia mater of the rat

Abstract

AIM: Identification of mast cells depends to great extent on the choice of the stain and the fixative, the type of mast cells and the tissue under study, and animal species. Based on this, this work aimed to find an optimal technique of histochemical revealing mast cells in the rat pia mater by testing three stains.

MATERIALS AND METHODS: The study was performed on the brain of Wistar rats 5, 14, and 30 day-old (n=15). 6–7 μm thick brain sections were Nissl stained with cresyl violet, toluidine blue, or methylene green and examined in Leica DM750 light microscope (Germany).

RESULTS: Mast cells were found in pia mater of rats of all ages studied after staining with each of used stains. They could be determined by their metachromatic staining. Use of cresyl violet or toluidine blue resulted in intensive staining of all cellular elements of the nervous tissue, but mastocytes were metachromatically weakly stained on this background and in some cases could not be differentiated from the surrounding tissue. After usage of methylene green, the brain section staining was paler, but metachromasia of bright stained mast cells was more contrast and could distinctly be registered by digital photography.

CONCLUSIONS: Metachromatic staining with methylene green is optimal for study of mast cells in the pia mater of the rat. It provides easy revealing of pial mastocytes and studying their morphologic features and is useful for morphometric analysis of mastocytes.

Keywords

mast cells / pia mater / histochemistry / methylene green / rat

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RIGHTS & PERMISSIONS

Korzhevskii D.E., Fedorova E.A., Sufieva D.A., Grigorev I.P.