Preparation of Single Cells for Correlative High Voltage and Scanning Electron Microscopy

Abstract

Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) has made a great deal of information on surface structure of isolated cells available, but no methods presently in use allow SEM information on cell surface structure to be directly correlated with internal cell ultrastructure. This situation is particularly unfortunate in the case of white blood cells which have historically been classified on the basis of internal morphology. We have found high voltage electron microscopy (HVEM) useful ingathering information on the morphology of unsectioned leukocytes due to the great penetrating power of the 1000 KV beam. Utilizing the technique discussed below, we have been able to obtain correlation of information gathered from single cells by HVEM with that obtained from the same cells using SEM.