A specimen is difficult to section and has a gummy consistency. What happened?

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Multiple Choice

A specimen is difficult to section and has a gummy consistency. What happened?

Fixation time controls how well tissue is preserved and hardened for sectioning. If tissue isn’t fixed long enough, enzymes remain active and the tissue stays water-rich, soft, and gummy, which makes it hard to cut cleanly. That gummy consistency is a classic sign of under-fixation. If fixation were too long, the tissue would become hard and brittle from over-crosslinking. Dehydration occurring too quickly tends to shrink and shrink-wrinkle tissue rather than leave it gummy, and an inadequate clearing agent mainly affects transparency and infiltration, not the gummy texture. So the observed gummy consistency points to insufficient fixation time.

Fixation time controls how well tissue is preserved and hardened for sectioning. If tissue isn’t fixed long enough, enzymes remain active and the tissue stays water-rich, soft, and gummy, which makes it hard to cut cleanly. That gummy consistency is a classic sign of under-fixation. If fixation were too long, the tissue would become hard and brittle from over-crosslinking. Dehydration occurring too quickly tends to shrink and shrink-wrinkle tissue rather than leave it gummy, and an inadequate clearing agent mainly affects transparency and infiltration, not the gummy texture. So the observed gummy consistency points to insufficient fixation time.

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