Fixing Caenorhabditis elegans in Bouin’s fixative

Ed Harlow; David Lane

doi:10.1101/pdb.prot4521

Protocol

Fixing Caenorhabditis elegans in Bouin’s fixative

Ed Harlow and
David Lane

This protocol was adapted from “Staining Tissues,” Chapter 6, in Using Antibodies by Ed Harlow and David Lane. Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press, Cold Spring Harbor, NY, USA, 1999.

INTRODUCTION

Bouin’s fixative is a particularly good choice for worms because it penetrates dense tissues well and is extremely good for fixing antigens. Like all strong fixatives, however, it is unsuitable for some antibody-antigen pairs. In such cases, the length of time in the Bouin’s fixative can be shortened, or paraformaldehyde fixation can be used instead.