When leveraging tissue clearing and 3D tissue imaging using confocal or light sheet microscopy, it is crucial to section brains and other organs into more manageable tissue sections for processing. The reason for this is that while it is possible to image whole brains and very thick tissues, labeling these tissues could take months and imaging them would require specialized imaging equipment. Therefore, through the use of a brain or tissue slicer, a researcher can section a tissue into uniform 1 or 2 mm thick sections that can be easily labeled and imaged with any confocal microscope.
For cleaning, these tissue slicers could be washed and cleaned with a liquid cleaner – they cannot be autoclaved.
