Visualizing ultrastructural details of placental tissue with super-resolution structured illumination microscopy

Luis E Villegas-Hernández; Mona Nystad; Florian Ströhl; Purusotam Basnet; Ganesh Acharya; Balpreet S Ahluwalia

doi:10.1016/j.placenta.2020.06.007

Visualizing ultrastructural details of placental tissue with super-resolution structured illumination microscopy

Placenta. 2020 Aug:97:42-45. doi: 10.1016/j.placenta.2020.06.007. Epub 2020 Jun 14.

Authors

Luis E Villegas-Hernández¹, Mona Nystad², Florian Ströhl¹, Purusotam Basnet³, Ganesh Acharya⁴, Balpreet S Ahluwalia⁵

Affiliations

¹ Department of Physics and Technology, UiT - The Arctic University of Norway, Tromsø, Norway.
² Department of Clinical Medicine, Women's Health and Perinatology Research Group, Faculty of Health Sciences, UiT - The Arctic University of Norway, Tromsø, Norway; Department of Medical Genetics, University Hospital of North Norway, Tromsø, Norway.
³ Department of Clinical Medicine, Women's Health and Perinatology Research Group, Faculty of Health Sciences, UiT - The Arctic University of Norway, Tromsø, Norway; Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, University Hospital of North Norway, Tromsø, Norway.
⁴ Department of Clinical Medicine, Women's Health and Perinatology Research Group, Faculty of Health Sciences, UiT - The Arctic University of Norway, Tromsø, Norway; Division of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Department of Clinical Science, Intervention and Technology, Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden. Electronic address: ganesh.acharya@ki.se.
⁵ Department of Physics and Technology, UiT - The Arctic University of Norway, Tromsø, Norway; Division of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Department of Clinical Science, Intervention and Technology, Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden. Electronic address: balpreet.singh.ahluwalia@uit.no.

PMID: 32792061
DOI: 10.1016/j.placenta.2020.06.007

Abstract

Super-resolution fluorescence microscopy is a widely employed technique in cell biology research, yet remains relatively unexplored in the field of histopathology. Here, we describe the sample preparation steps and acquisition parameters necessary to obtain fluorescent multicolor super-resolution structured illumination microscopy (SIM) images of both formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded and cryo-preserved placental tissue sections. We compare super-resolved images of chorionic villi against diffraction-limited deconvolution microscopy and show the significant contrast and resolution enhancement attainable with SIM, demonstrating the applicability of this imaging technique for both clinical diagnosis and biological research.

Keywords: Chorionic villi; Microvilli brush border; Optical nanoscopy; Placenta; Structured illumination microscopy; Super-resolution microscopy.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Chorionic Villi / ultrastructure*
Female
Humans
Microscopy, Fluorescence / methods*
Placenta / ultrastructure*
Pregnancy