Dear All,
I am currently trying to understand the different cell types and structures in poplar wood slices, and I have difficulties distinguishing vessel members from rays in the tangential section.
At first, I was sure that the structurs marked red in the images are vessel members with pits, but now I found images during my literature research that make me doubt that... Maybe they are rays that have been cut perpendicular?
Or are rays the cells marked with blue arrows in the attached images?
The first image was taken with a 20x objective, the other two with 63x objectives. The poplar slice is approx. 20 µm thick.
I am thankful for any advice :)
Kind regards,
Lena
Hi Lena,
I think on image 1 they are all tracheids ie xylem cells, but they differ in their lignin deposition patterns.
In red you can see a reticulated deposition, while blue arrows show ring/spiral depositions.
On image 2 and 3 the blue arrows seem to show small ray cells rather than a ring/spiral pattern.
If I remember well, the ray cells have cellulose deposition while xylem sieve elements have lignins, and you could distinguish the chemical composition by fluorescence emission. Lignin emission under UV excitation appears pale blue, and under blue excitation it appears yellowish green, while cellulose doesn't fluoresce.
Cheers
Oliv
Hi Oliv,
Thanks a lot for your answer!
So, you don't think that there are any vessel (members) in my slices?
I found these images during my research, which look very similar to my structures which are assigned as vessels here:
https://apps.jefpat.maryland.gov/woodandcharcoalid/Webpages-trees/LargeImages-Trees/Maple/AcerHard-Tcomp02.htm
Since adjecent to some of the elements there is something that could be identified as perforation plate, I believed that they are vessels...? Also in the publication by Dejardin et al., 2010 (screenshot attached) I saw a similarity to my structures.
I also attached the fluorescence image (Ex at 405 nm) of the images from above together with an overlay of transmittion and fluorescence image - does this help in any way?
Cheers,
Lena
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