How do I know if I have stained the filaments correctly or have identified the correct filament

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How do I know if I have stained the filaments correctly or have identified the correct filament?

Let's see what happens under the microscope

These phomicrographs were taken from wastewater samples. Gram Stains, and Neisser Stains were used. Most of the objectives used were 1000x.

Come take a closer look at the amazing world under the microscope!

Test yourself and see if you can identify your own filaments. If you cannot, you can always cheat and find the corresponding filament sheets and compare!!!

Be careful not to get to worried that the cells on the filament do not look exactly alike. They can change and look slightly different in the exact same sample depending upon their growth stage.

We will start with S. Natans, since that is a relatively easy filament to identify due to the false branching.

	The cells are supposed to be round ended, but as you can see above in the lower filament, they appear to be rectangular
Remember, that even though it appears to be 2 dimensional to you, it is in reality a 3 dimensional slide. When the filaments are suspended in the water and are drying on the slide, some of the cells or sheath may get twisted while drying and thus create weird shapes. That is common, so do now worry that you have identified the filament incorrectly or that there is more than one filament type present.

	The false branching is always a dead giveaway for S. Natans

It stains Gram Negative (or red)

and Neisser negative ( or brown)




	You can see the sheath and some missing cells in this photo
here you can see that some of the cells appear square ended and in the vertical filament, the cells are stressed and very irregular