Freeze fracture of intact plant tissues.

A procedure for dissolving and handling replicas of cutinized leaves and other plant tissues is described. This technique yields comparatively large replicas which can include vascular tissue, epidermal cells and the cuticle. Dissolution of the tissue involves the sequential use of alcoholic KOH, sulfuric acid and chromic acid. The use of clean, uncoated grids for transfer of the tissue and replicas results in rapid, easy handling with a minimum of breakage or loss. The procedure is more efficient than previous methods and produces large replicas. This allows tissue orientation and more positive identification of cell types for better correlation of freeze fracture results with thin sections of similar material.