Dear Joseph,

I´ve been using vibroslice devices from WPI for several years. Both, the manual and the motorized advance models work well enough for routine use in slicing fresh brain tissue for patch clamp experiments. Besides they are not too expensive.

Dear Andrei and David, thank you both for your very useful answers. Andrei I'd be very interested to hear how your Campden 7000-smz-2 works out. I'm also intrigued by this Compresstome - does it have any drawbacks? Thanks again.

Leica VT1200S with cooling unit is actually a perfect slicer with excellent retention of cell viability, especially in slices from old animals (5-8 months old). It is quite expensive but well worth the money.   

Jospeh jumping in the between you and Andrei. I am using both Compresstome and Leica VT 1200. And I would say Leica is giving better results when it comes to Electrophysiology. Compresstome is better for immuno-histo but cells health is much better for recording with Leica may be because I am able to bubble my prep better. Leica you can also change your parameters in between slices then again I am little biased for leica always worked with Leica. No doubt compress tome is cheaper then VT 1200 but VT1200 is giving better results in practice. 

Leica VT1200S and Microm HM 650 V are both very good and allow slicing with live cells within the first 15µm from the surface

Leica VT1200S with a cooling unit

Dosaka is also making good vibratomes for patch-clamp, I used one of them (DTK-1000). May be you can have a look at their prices.

I had used vibratomes for about 20 years until I switched to the Leica VT1200. Although, it is a few thousand dollars more than other instruments, I think it is worth the extra investment. It produces dramatically better slices in my hands.

Hello Josheph,

Here are my thoughts on your question.

I have always used Lecia vibratomes to prepare acute brain slices and have been happy with those devices. The VibraCheck function to eliminate vertical displacement is a nice feature on the 1200 model.

However, having read this paper on making brain slices from older mice, I like the sound of the Precisionary Instruments VF-200 Compresstome. Cheaper than Lecia models too.

Pete

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/25023312/

You may try to call Leica rep Rob Masterson at +1 401-822-1788

Address:  Leica Microsystems Inc. 1700 Leider Lane, Buffalo Grove, IL, USA  60089

Hello Joseph,

Thanks for posting your question.

I agree with previous responses that Leica offers state-of-the art vibratoms. They are really expensive though and their customer service is not very attentive.

We have recently purchased vibratome 7000 smz (Campden Instruments, Loughborough, England) and it cuts beautiful brain slices. For making good slices it is definitely worth trying using an NMDG-based cutting solution for mice older than 5 weeks. The recipe will be in the paper that Peter recommended. Otherwise please contact me back in this regard.

Thanks,

Ewa

Thank you all so much for your incredibly useful answers. The Cambden Instruments 7000 smz sounds like a good option. As a rough guide I was quoted about £9000 for the 7000 smz and £11000 for the Leica VT1200.

Although the VF-200 Compresstome sounds intriguing I've read that it might be less versatile and components often need replacing.

Hi Joseph, I am the author on the adult brain slice paper mentioned, and a proponent of the NMDG aCSF formulations suggested for adult mouse slices.  I have used Leica VT1000S, VT1200S with vibrocheck, and the Compresstome VF200.  I feel the 1000S is not ideal and mainly used for fixed brain tissue slicing.  The other models work great for adult brain tissue with clean surfaces with many healthy cells near the surface that are accessible for patching.  I have used the Compresstome for many years now and rarely need to replace parts.  Even so, the cost and time required to do so are very minimal compared to repairs on a Leica model.  I have had weeks to months delay on repairs for several Leica slicers in the past.  I do like the VT1200S but would rather pay $8K for a Compresstome VF-200 instead of $24K for the Leica VT1200S with vibrocheck, especially since both are good for my patch clamp studies.  I am now using the Compresstome for human brain slicing and whole cell patching with excellent success, in some cases the live tissue comes from patients that are up to 70 years old.  In summary, I have had good results with mouse, rat and human adult brain tissue slicing.

Hi Jonathan,

I am glad that you are here so I could thank you for promoting the NMDG-based cutting aCSF. I must acknowledge that replacement of Na ions with NMDG led to the break-through in my brain slice preparations especially from adult animals.

Ewa

Dear Jonathan, Thank you for all the effort you've put into the age old issue of optimising brain slice techniques. I found your http://www.brainslicemethods.com/ site via labrigger a while ago - very useful indeed! On your advice the Compresstome may well be the way to go. Thanks again.

Ewa, Joseph and Andrei are right, the NMDG method is awesome!!!

Kudos to Jonathan for reviving this technique.  We capture extracellular recordings on a multi electrode array, and the NMDG method makes a tremendous difference. Thanks,. Jonathan!

Sorry,  couldn't help, I'm a fan.

But back to the topic of the post:  The compresstome sounds great.  But how does it perform  when you need to section at oblique angles?  We do a lot of thalamocortical sectioning.

Hi, and thanks to all for the positive comments.  Joseph--I hope you got what you need.  I really enjoyed your recent study in Nature Neuroscience on Arch and NpHR.

Kevin, I think you can easily do any slicing angle with the Compresstome models, but you need to work at the blocking and mounting technique to make it reliable.  I often use a special angle for hippocampal CA1 slice preparation from whole brain blocks in order to slice both hemispheres simultaneously, and have found this to work very reliably.  In fact, the agarose embedding makes it even easier to maintain the intended angle of slicing, assuming you are able to securely glue the base down.  I also did oblique angles for cortico-striatal recordings, and in my experience it is more about how reliable the human is in blocking at the correct angle rather than a limitation of the machine.  The small size of the specimen holder for the Compresstome may prevent you from slicing the whole brain or whole hemisphere, but there is now a larger specimen holder available that might help improve that, if required.

Hi Joseph,

We are about to purchase a Pelco EasiSlicer. What did you end up getting? What were your results with the equipment you used? Historically Leica equipment has been used in our research. We are going to test how much movement along the z-axis there is. We have been assured it's suitable for making 40micron brain slices. Feel free to check in with me at a later date.

Article An organization of visual and auditory fear conditioning in ...

Hi Kim, we still haven't bought the slicer yet so I'd be interested in how you find the EasiSlicer, and how much z-axis movement you observe. I'm still leaning toward the Compresstome but not sure...

Hi all this is a brief update, I ended up purchasing a Compresstome VF200. I've been using it for the past 2 weeks and it has really lived up to my expectations - these are the best slices I have ever seen, the cells are super happy. Granted I have never used the leica VT1200S but compared to a pretty fancy MicroM HM 650 V I used during my phd the compresstome slices are WAY better despite the instrument looking much simpler. I can't recommend it enough - it's also WAY cheaper than other slicers on the market. Thank you Jonathan for the recommendaiton.

Hello Jonathan, for mice and rats brain sectioning which of the compresstome 300-800 is most appropriate?

I'm trying to buy VT-1000s Vibratome to section fresh Medicago trucatula plant root nodules. I need to get three quotes for ordering purpose. What are the equivalent alternative Vibratomes for Leica VT-1000S ?. Thanks. 

We use Leica VT1000S for rat and mouse hippocampus and cortical slicing. The ephys (MEA) results are great.

Thanks Chang-Ning

Please someone shed some light on this. Now, I've the option of buying either Leica VT1000S or Campden 7000smz-2 for slicing fresh tissues, which one is good from users experience ?.

I'm trying to use the Compresstome for mouse spinal cord. Does anyone have experience with this application?

While I would love to have both a compresstome and a VT1200S, my funding request requires that I buy one or the other. I seem to be finding a lot of people going back to using the Leica VT1200S over the Compresstome for hippocampal slices, as there seems to be a perception that they produce better slices more reliably, and without the requiring the use of agar, so I'm going to request enough to purchase a VT1200S. Does anyone have any additional input on how well both perform for whole-cell patch clamp studies in the hippocampus and cortex?

We bought the Leica Vibratome VT1200S to bisect mouse photoreceptors, unfortunately we have nothing but headaches. For a whole year we couldn't get it to work. In the past we used an old vibratome that works beautifully and smoothly.

On the top of the price for the machine, we paid $3000 for an engineer to fix a problem that happened in day one we used (error 21), and another $3000 to calibrate the machine (remember this supposed to be a new machine and in orderly working stage). By the way we are not the only one having problems with this machine, another group on UCI campus also dealing with error 21, suggesting that this is a flaw in the design.

I would never recommend this "waist of money" to anybody.

In my experience, slice quality is 20% hardware, 20% dissection/perfussion skills (everyone acquired them in ~ 6 months), and the 60% remaining is the combination of cutting/storage/recording solutions. You must play much more with the solutions than with the hardware, as you would use different cocktails depending on 1) cell type (e.g., inhibitory, excitatory, dopaminergic, etc.. ), 2) brain region and 3) age of the animal.

Having said that, there's a strong consensus that for neocortical slices, the compressome would do it well in both young and adults. For subcellular or hippocampal slices, the Leica VT1200S (+ vibrocheck) is the way to go.

Hope it helps!