title: Preservative solution for skeletal muscle biopsy samples.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Muscle biopsy samples must be frozen with liquid nitrogen immediately after excision and maintained at -80°C until analysis. Because of this requirement for tissue processing, patients with neuromuscular diseases often have to travel to centers with on-site muscle pathology laboratories for muscle biopsy sample excision to ensure that samples are properly preserved.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  Here, we developed a preservative solution and examined its protectiveness on striated muscle tissues for a minimum of the length of time that would be required to reach a specific muscle pathology laboratory.
  
  
  METHODS
  A preservative solution called Kurt-Ozcan (KO) solution was prepared. Eight healthy Sprague-Dawley rats were sacrificed; striated muscle tissue samples were collected and divided into six different groups. Muscle tissue samples were separated into groups for morphological, enzyme histochemical, molecular, and biochemical analysis.
  Chi-square and Kruskal Wallis tests.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Samples kept in the KO and University of Wisconsin (UW) solutions exhibited very good morphological scores at 3, 6, and 18 hours, but artificial changes were observed at 24 hours. Similar findings were observed for the evaluated enzyme activities. There were no differences between the control group and the samples kept in the KO or UW solution at 3, 6, and 18 hours for morphological, enzyme histochemical, and biochemical features. The messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA) of β-actin gene was protected up to 6 hours in the KO and UW solutions.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The KO solution protects the morphological, enzyme histochemical, and biochemical features of striated muscle tissue of healthy rats for 18 hours and preserves the mRNA for 6 hours.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biochemistry, Gulhane Military Medical Academy, Ankara, Turkey.
authors.forename: Yasemin Gulcan
authors.initials: YG
authors.lastname: Kurt
authors.affiliation: Department of Pathology, Gulhane Military Medical Academy, Ankara, Turkey.
authors.forename: Bulent
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Kurt
authors.affiliation: Department of Biochemistry, Haydarpasa Military Hospital, Istanbul, Turkey.
authors.forename: Omer
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Ozcan
authors.affiliation: Department of Physiology, Gulhane Military Medical Academy, Ankara, Turkey.
authors.forename: Turgut
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Topal
authors.affiliation: Department of Microbiology, Gulhane Military Medical Academy, Ankara, Turkey.
authors.forename: Abdullah
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Kilic
authors.affiliation: Department of Biochemistry, Haydarpasa Military Hospital, Istanbul, Turkey.
authors.forename: Tuba
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Muftuoglu
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology, Gulhane Military Medical Academy, Ankara, Turkey.
authors.forename: Cengizhan
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Acikel
authors.affiliation: Department of Microbiology, Gulhane Military Medical Academy, Ankara, Turkey.
authors.forename: Kenan
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Sener
authors.affiliation: Department of Microbiology, Gulhane Military Medical Academy, Ankara, Turkey.
authors.forename: Fatih
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Sahiner
authors.affiliation: Department of Pathology, Gulhane Military Medical Academy, Ankara, Turkey.
authors.forename: Nuri
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Yigit
authors.affiliation: Department of Biochemistry, Sarikamis Military Hospital, Kars, Turkey.
authors.forename: Ibrahim
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Aydin
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurology, Gulhane Military Medical Academy, Ankara, Turkey.
authors.forename: Semih
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Alay
authors.affiliation: Department of Orthopedics, Agrı Military Hospital, Agrı, Turkey.
authors.forename: Safak
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Ekinci
keywords: Enzyme activity; mRNA; morphology; preservative solution; skeletal muscle tissue