Chemical Sectioning for Immunofluorescence Imaging

Anal Chem. 2021 Jun 29;93(25):8698-8703. doi: 10.1021/acs.analchem.1c01702. Epub 2021 Jun 17.

Abstract

Immunofluorescence (IF) is a powerful investigative tool in biological research and medical diagnosis, whereas conventional imaging methods are always conflict between speed, contrast/resolution, and specimen volume. Chemical sectioning (CS) is an effective method to overcome the conflict, which works by chemically manipulating the off/on state of fluorescent materials and turning on only the extremely superficial surface fluorescence of tissues to realize the sectioning capacity of wide-field imaging. However, the current mechanism of CS is only applicable to samples labeled with pH-sensitive fluorescent proteins and still cannot fulfill samples immunolabeled with frequently used commercial fluorescent dyes. Here, immunofluorescence chemical sectioning (IF-CS) is described to present an off/on mechanism for Alexa dyes by complexation reactions, allowing CS imaging of IF labeled tissues. IF-CS enables IF freeing from out-of-focus interference in wide-field imaging and satisfying with multicolor imaging. IF-CS demonstrates the utility of the 3D submicron-resolution imaging of large immunolabeled tissues on the wide-field block-face system. IF-CS may remarkably facilitate systematic studies of refined subcellular architectures of endogenous proteins in intact biological systems.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Fluorescent Antibody Technique
  • Fluorescent Dyes*
  • Histological Techniques*
  • Imaging, Three-Dimensional

Substances

  • Fluorescent Dyes