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A Note On Paraffin Waxes, Their Crystals, And Microtoming

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 March 2018

Russ Allison*
Affiliation:
University of Wales College of Medicine

Extract

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Paraffin wax is a mixture of (virtually) straight chain hydrocarbons. Note the word “mixture”. Unless one goes to the enormous lengths of purifying or searching for a fine chemical supplier, the wax will always be a mixture. I used a “pure” wax once as a standard for gas chromatographic studies on paraffin waxes. There is a relationship between hydrocarbon chain length and melting point, but as the waxes are always mixtures, melting points are never exact, either in the compounding or the measuring.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Microscopy Society of America 1998

References

References:

Ailison, R.T. 1978. The crystalline nature of histology waxes: a preliminary communication. Med, Lab. Sciences 35:355363 Google Scholar
Allison, R.T. 1979. The crystalline nature of histology waxes: the effects of microtomy on the microstructure of paraffin wax sections. Med. Lab. Sciences 36:359372.Google Scholar
Culling, C.F.A., Allison, R.T. & Barr, W.T.. 1985. Cellular Pathology Technique, 4th ed. Butterworths, London. Chapter 4 pp5859 and Chapter 5 pp91-98.Google Scholar