Why methylene blue is used to stain cheek cells? Why was iodine used to stain onion epidermis cells?

Iodine is used because it detects cellulose (onion cells), chitin, and glycogen, in which potassium iodide reacts with starch to produce a blue color.

Wright's stain is a technique in histology that is used to make the differences between cells visible under light microscopy.

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RE:

Why methylene blue is used to stain cheek cells? Why was iodine used to stain onion epidermis cells?

Blue Iodine

Iodine is used as a mordant, meaning it helps the methylene blue adhere to the specific nucleic acids and phospholipids by attraction (chemotaxis). Without the iodine theres a good chance the methylene blue will run off of the wanted organelle without adherence. Im not too sure about onion cells but if the cell wall is made of some kind of lipid bi-layer then with the application of the iodine the methylene blue will adhere. Hope it helps

because that is what the stainer chose to stain with. these stains are simple and inexpensive. they get the job done though. but the answer is more complivated. the purpose of using different stains is to visualize different parts of the cell. some basic stains are used to stain nuclear material and some acid stains are used to stain cytoplasmic material. some stains are very simple ie. iodine. some stains are very complex and reveal a lot of structure hemotoxilin triple stain... some are expensive, gold and flourescent, and antibody mediated staining. when staining you should consider what you want to see.

look up histology and histo-technique

there are very few histo-technique classes in the country (US 5) so this is an easy job to get. lots of work and routine solvent exposure (benzene) and fun

you do this so that you can see everything in the cell. im pretty sure you could use iodine to stain cheek cells and vice versa

because the iodine can detect the present of starch in the plant cell

methylene blue is used to dye animal cells

iodine is better to dye plant cells

the cellulose picks it up better