Damage to tendon in athletes and horses are common in sports. We tried to identify the extent of such damage by mimicking injury by treating horse tendons using collagenase. The image is showing a horse tendon labeled with picrosirius red dye which labels collagen. The Nanozoomer Microscope in the Core Facilities at IGB is routinely used for brightfield and fluorescence imaging. Mayandi Sivaguru, Assistant Director of the Core Facilities modified the light path by incorporating polarizers thereby the same system could be used as a polarized microscope for imaging birefringent samples. The image is produced after such alteration and showing the plane polarized images of collagen fibers in a horse tendon. Similar color hue indicates molecules with similar orientation. Also the pleat structure is clearly revealed.
