Student Presenter(s): Elizabeth Alayev, Kyle Mcpherson, John Mari, Isha Gujare, Anjali Siluveru
Faculty Mentor: Claude Gagna
School/College: Arts and Sciences, Old Westbury

A normal adult bovine eye globe (i.e., black angus) was processed in Davidson’s fixative (i.e., alcohol-formalin-acetic acid-based tissue fixative) for 72 hours. Excess fixative was removed with washing in water at room temperature (RT) for 1 hour, and then stored in 70% ethanol (i.e., histology grade). Eye globe was allowed to dry at RT, in the dark. The eye globe was then scanned, using a micro-computed tomography (micro-CT) scanner for visualizing, reconstructing, and analyzing the morphology of the eye globe in three dimensions (i.e., College of Osteopathic Medicine, Imaging Core Facility, Old Westbury, NY). The micro-CT scanner uses X-rays to reveal the internal structure of the eye globe at the microscopic level, without having to section them, i.e., histotechnological processing of tissues in order to obtain tissue sections. The eye globe is not destroyed as part of our investigation of internal structures. The micro-CT scanner our group used was the SkyScan 1173 micro-CT system (Bruker, Carteret, NJ), and it can image samples with submicron resolution or scan objects up to 200mm or more in diameter. The purpose of this project was to begin a series of eye globe scans with tissues processed in different fixatives (e.g., 10% NBF, Carnoy’s, Bouin’s, FAA), in order to examine the effect of fixation on eye globe structure, and individual components, such as the cornea, lens, and retina.