List of Stains

Stain	Uses	Tissue Components Targeted	Mechanism of Staining	Stains Used Primary Secondary	Other Reagents
Hematoxylin & Eosin (H&E)	General tissue staining	Nuclei - blue RBCs - red/dark pink Muscle - pink Collagen - light pink		Harris Hematoxylin (nuclear) Eosin Y (cytoplasm)	Harris Hematoxylin Acid Alcohol Scott's tap water substitute Eosin Y
Periodic Acid-Schiff (PAS)
Alcian Blue (AB)
Alcian Blue + Periodic Acid-Schiff (AB PAS)
Congo Red
Masson Trichrome	Identifying fibrotic tissue
Gordon and Sweet's Reticulin	Differential diagnosis of certain tumour types
Verhoeff's Van Giesen
Oil Red O	Identifying triglycerides, lipids, and lipoproteins