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UF Health University of Florida
Molecular Pathology Core Histology & IHC; Pathology, Immunology, and Lab. Med., College of Medicine
Submit samples
Services Overview

Digital Pathology-Whole Slide Images

A whole slide image (WSI) is accomplished by digital scanning and allows online viewing of your stained section. The current instrument is an Olympus VS200 scanner with both brightfield and fluorescence capabilities.

Submit Slides

Clinical slides? Must conceal private health information (PHI) with a temporary opaque label (tape, labels available).    
  • Submit the online Slide Scanning Request.
  • Drop off slides at the front D11-41 submissions counter.
  • Turnaround time is 0.5-2 work days depending on the total slide number and current workload. Let staff know of any deadlines. 
  • Install free viewing software (next section)
  • You will receive an email when the WSI files are ready for transfer using DropBox.

View scans- Freeware

Each slide scan will have a folder and thumbnail view of both slide label and scanned area.

Publications

    • Please acknowledge funding as follows: The Olympus VS200 was purchased with a shared instrumentation grant from the Office of the Director at the National Institutes of Health (S10OD032236).

Preparing slides for scanning

Best scanning results will be obtained from glass slides with #1.5 thickness coverslips and regular thickness (4-5 microns) tissues. Slides with marks (such as ink dots), extra mounting medium, non-glass slides, plastic coverslips, thick labels, and labels that are going around the slide present challenges for automatically finding the tissue and proper imaging. These artifacts may need to be removed to obtain an optimal scan. Images are individually reviewed once the scanning is completed. Scans with poor quality will be rescanned manually to achieve the maximum quality possible.

Slides must be completely dry before scanning. The equipment can not scan slides with wet mounting media, more than two slide labels, labels on the back or the bottom of the slide, double slides, or broken slides. The slide and coverslip should be free of fingerprints, dust, and dirt. Any pen marker on the slide also need to be removed as the scanner will consider such marks as tissue. Faint stains, air bubbles, thick sections (> 50um), or marks on the glass surface can cause lower scan quality. In some cases, sample recut or restaining may be recommended.

Scanning fees and invoicing

Please visit the Fee page for information on costs and billing.