Specific Vital Staining of Shizomycetes by Calcofluor White M2R

Abstract

A basic dye commercially used as the brightener agent in detergents of the washings, , Calcofluor white, was found by Darken to be useful for the vital staining of several bacteria. Our study was further developed in respect to a specificity of a differential staining between animal and plant cells. Several cells of plant origin such as bacteria, Candida and Chlorophyta can be stained by the dye, but all of the tissue culture cells of animal origin so far examined can not be stained at all. When 100mcg/ml of the dye was added to the cells without receiving any fixation procedure, the plant cells can be differentiated from the animal cells, instantaeneously.
Although the living bacteria without any fixation are never stained with dyes such as methylene blue, the bacteria labeled with Calcofluor white, which were able to grow and divide, were stained with a solution of methylen blue.