Spirit Collections

[Alan Harvey]

John Simmons wrote:

...

>Formaldehyde is a good to excellent preservative for most tissues, but
>not a good preservative for most tissues ...

Was this supposed to read: "Formaldehyde is a good to excellent fixative
for most tissues, but not a good preservative for most tissues ..." ?  If
so (actually, even if not), could someone explain the difference between
"fixation" and "preservation"?  This must be an embarrassingly elementary
question, but I've had a hard time finding a definition of the term
"fixation" that is explicit and relevant to collection studies.  E.g., I
vaguely recall the phrase "cross-linking of proteins" in connection with
fixation, but don't know why that's beneficial to specimen preparations.

Cheers,

Alan

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Alan W. Harvey (aharvey at amnh.org)
Assistant Curator of Invertebrates
American Museum of Natural History
Central Park West at 79th Street
New York, NY 10024
(212) 769-5638