Rapid Freezing of Freeze-Etch Specimens

The importance of a high rate of temperature decrease (“rapid freezing”) when freezing specimens for freeze-etching has long been recognized1. The two basic methods for achieving rapid freezing are: 1) dropping the specimen onto a metal surface at low temperature, 2) bringing the specimen instantaneously into thermal contact with a liquid at low temperature and subsequently maintaining a high relative velocity between the liquid and the specimen. Over the last couple of years the first method has received strong renewed interest, particularily as the result of a series of important studies by Heuser and coworkers 2,3. In this paper we will compare these two freezing methods theoretically and experimentally.