Negative stain

The specimen, such as a wet bacterial culture spread on a glass slide, is mixed with the negative stain and allowed to dry.

An alternative method has been developed using an ordinary waterproof marking pen to deliver the negative stain.

As strong oxidants, they cross-link lipids mainly by reacting with unsaturated carbon-carbon bonds, and thereby both fix biological membranes in place in tissue samples and simultaneously stain them.

Negative staining is usually a very mild preparation method and thus does not reduce the possibility of operator infection.

Negative staining transmission electron microscopy has also been successfully employed for study and identification of aqueous lipid aggregates like lamellar liposomes (le), inverted spherical micelles (M) and inverted hexagonal HII cylindrical (H) phases (see figure).