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Purification of Alcian Blue

Commercially available Alcian Blue (EMS #10350) contains about 49% dye; the remaining constituents are boric acid, sulphates, dextrin, and other unknown organic substances. It can be purified by the following method, presented by McAuliffe. W.G. McAuliffe (1983) - A Note on the Purification of Alcian Blue. Stain Technology, 58, pg 374.

One gram of Alcian Blue is placed in a flask to which is added 100ml of 9:1 mixture of acetone and distilled water.
This mixture is stirred for 1 hour and then filtered through No. 2 filter paper. Small quantities of additional acetone are used to wash the dye from the flask and down the side of the filter paper.
The filtrate has a faint yellow-green color. The residue is recovered from the filter paper and dried.
Small quantities of the dye should be purified as they are needed.

The above method yields Alcian Blue containing about 78.7-83.5% dye, depending on the commercial source.

Reference:

Hayat, M. A. (Ed.). (1989). Principles and Techniques of Electron Microscopy. Third

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