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Updated: Aug 14, 2026

Histochemical Staining of Arabidopsis thaliana Secondary Cell Wall Elements
Published on: May 14, 2014
Whole-mount silver staining of Arabidopsis and maize: a new method for staining secondary wall thickenings in
Sakihito Kitajima1, Yoko Hasegawa, Yukio Sugimura
1Graduate School of Science and Technology, Kyoto Institute of Technology, Kyoto 606-8585, Japan. sakito@kit.ac.jp
Abstract:
Secondary wall thickenings in tracheary elements were specifically stained by incubation of Arabidopsis and maize in Silver Stain Plus (Bio-Rad) staining solution, after pretreatment with SDS and ethanol solution. Scanning electron microscopic analysis of sections of celery revealed that silver particles were deposited on the secondary wall thickenings, indicating that the staining was due to the deposition of silver through the interaction of the stain with lignin. This method is more sensitive than the acidified phloroglucinol method.
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