Microscopy and staining for food.

[battered]

I work in food. One of the sites I visit makes mayonnaise and salad dressing, so they are into emulsions and suspension. We are getting trouble with air entrainment and foams, and I want to get some science on the job.

The plan is to examine the globule size, and stain the fat and water phases a different colour, under a microscope. Ideally I'd have oil one colour, water another, air will then be colourless. Then I can use a graticule to measure it. I know this technology exists.

Any tips for: an inexpensive scope, say 200-300 pounds, no junk, just a decent student quality thing, no need for Zeiss and Leica bench jewellery.

Microscope stains for oil and water.

[Mr2Mike]

My wife is a biomedical scientist and stains tissue samples as part of her job. She suggests "Oil Red O" or "Sudan Black" dissolved in alcohol (ethanol/IDA or iso-propanol) for a lipid (fat) stain. For the water, a water based food coloring should work fine.

Edited by Mr2Mike on Sunday 31st July 10:45

[battered]

Mr2Mike said:

My wife is a biomedical scientist and stains tissue samples as part of her job. She suggests "Oil Red O" or "Sudan Black" dissolved in alcohol (ethanol/IDA or iso-propanol) for a lipid (fat) stain. For the water, a water based food coloring should work fine.

That sounds like a winner, thanks.

[Mr2Mike]

Forgot to add, for a decent entry level microscope you could take a look at the range made by "Apex". Amazon sell most of their models and you can get a stereo one for about £150. We bought our daughter a mid-range Apex model for a birthday present a few years back and I was very pleased with the quality of the construction and image quality for the price.