Figure 3.

The trail-blazing precursor techniques of the modern tissue microarrays. (A–D) The multitumor (sausage) tissue block by Battifora. Fixed tissue rods (r) stacked like log piles were tightly wrapped in amnion (a) (instead of Battifora’s small intestine of small mammals) (A), secured by thin thread (th) (B), paraffinized (C), trimmed and cast into a standard paraffin block (D). (E–I) The multi-tissue straws of Wan et al. Sections of an ordinary red plastic drinking straw were fixed in a standard steel embedding mold by a little amount of paraffin (E) to enhance the installment of paraffin tissue core biopsies (PTCBs) (own modification) (one PTCB on the tip of the needle) (F). These filled straws were melted to glue the PTCBs together (G). After resolidification the plastic encasement was removed (H) and the composed PTCBs embedded in a standard paraffin block (I). (J–M) The checkerboard tissue block by Battifora and Mehta. Stripes of fixed tissue were poured into agar plates (J), the plates were stacked (K), paraffinized (L), trimmed and cast into a standard paraffin block. The cut surface with the brown tissue rods and the white surrounding agar. (M) (Note: alignment of the rods not as precise as by Battifora and Mehta).