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Now showing 1 - 6 of 6
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    Advances in bioimaging - Challenges and potentials
    (Bristol : IOP Publ., 2018) Eggeling, Christian
    [No abstract available]
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    Complementary studies of lipid membrane dynamics using iSCAT and super-resolved fluorescence correlation spectroscopy
    (Bristol : IOP Publ., 2018) Reina, Francesco; Galiani, Silvia; Shrestha, Dilip; Sezgin, Erdinc; de Wit, Gabrielle; Cole, Daniel; Christoffer Lagerholm, B.; Kukura, Philipp; Eggeling, Christian
    Observation techniques with high spatial and temporal resolution, such as single-particle tracking based on interferometric scattering (iSCAT) microscopy, and fluorescence correlation spectroscopy applied on a super-resolution STED microscope (STED-FCS), have revealed new insights of the molecular organization of membranes. While delivering complementary information, there are still distinct differences between these techniques, most prominently the use of fluorescent dye tagged probes for STED-FCS and a need for larger scattering gold nanoparticle tags for iSCAT. In this work, we have used lipid analogues tagged with a hybrid fluorescent tag–gold nanoparticle construct, to directly compare the results from STED-FCS and iSCAT measurements of phospholipid diffusion on a homogeneous supported lipid bilayer (SLB). These comparative measurements showed that while the mode of diffusion remained free, at least at the spatial (>40 nm) and temporal (50  ⩽  t  ⩽  100 ms) scales probed, the diffussion coefficient was reduced by 20- to 60-fold when tagging with 20 and 40 nm large gold particles as compared to when using dye tagged lipid analogues. These FCS measurements of hybrid fluorescent tag–gold nanoparticle labeled lipids also revealed that commercially supplied streptavidin-coated gold nanoparticles contain large quantities of free streptavidin. Finally, the values of apparent diffusion coefficients obtained by STED-FCS and iSCAT differed by a factor of 2–3 across the techniques, while relative differences in mobility between different species of lipid analogues considered were identical in both approaches. In conclusion, our experiments reveal that large and potentially cross-linking scattering tags introduce a significant slow-down in diffusion on SLBs but no additional bias, and our labeling approach creates a new way of exploiting complementary information from STED-FCS and iSCAT measurements.
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    High photon count rates improve the quality of super-resolution fluorescence fluctuation spectroscopy
    (Bristol : IOP Publ., 2020) Schneider, Falk; Hernandez-Varas, Pablo; Lagerholm, B. Christoffer; Shrestha, Dilip; Sezgin, Erdinc; Roberti, M. Julia; Ossato, Giulia; Hecht, Frank; Eggeling, Christian; Urbančič, Iztok
    Probing the diffusion of molecules has become a routine measurement across the life sciences, chemistry and physics. It provides valuable insights into reaction dynamics, oligomerisation, molecular (re-)organisation or cellular heterogeneities. Fluorescence correlation spectroscopy (FCS) is one of the widely applied techniques to determine diffusion dynamics in two and three dimensions. This technique relies on the temporal autocorrelation of intensity fluctuations but recording these fluctuations has thus far been limited by the detection electronics, which could not efficiently and accurately time-tag photons at high count rates. This has until now restricted the range of measurable dye concentrations, as well as the data quality of the FCS recordings, especially in combination with super-resolution stimulated emission depletion (STED) nanoscopy. Here, we investigate the applicability and reliability of (STED-)FCS at high photon count rates (average intensities of more than 1 MHz) using novel detection equipment, namely hybrid detectors and real-time gigahertz sampling of the photon streams implemented on a commercial microscope. By measuring the diffusion of fluorophores in solution and cytoplasm of live cells, as well as in model and cellular membranes, we show that accurate diffusion and concentration measurements are possible in these previously inaccessible high photon count regimes. Specifically, it offers much greater flexibility of experiments with biological samples with highly variable intensity, e.g. due to a wide range of expression levels of fluorescent proteins. In this context, we highlight the independence of diffusion properties of cytosolic GFP in a concentration range of approx. 0.01-1 µm. We further show that higher photon count rates also allow for much shorter acquisition times, and improved data quality. Finally, this approach also pronouncedly increases the robustness of challenging live cell STED-FCS measurements of nanoscale diffusion dynamics, which we testify by confirming a free diffusion pattern for a fluorescent lipid analogue on the apical membrane of adherent cells. © The Author(s). Published by IOP Publishing Ltd.
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    The 2015 super-resolution microscopy roadmap
    (Bristol : IOP Publ., 2015) Hell, Stefan W.; Sahl, Steffen J.; Bates, Mark; Zhuang, Xiaowei; Heintzmann, Rainer; Booth, Martin J.; Bewersdorf, Joerg; Shtengel, Gleb; Hess, Harald; Tinnefeld, Philip; Honigmann, Alf; Jakobs, Stefan; Testa, Ilaria; Cognet, Laurent; Lounis, Brahim; Ewers, Helge; Davis, Simon J.; Eggeling, Christian; Klenerman, David; Willig, Katrin I.; Vicidomini, Giuseppe; Castello, Marco; Diaspro, Alberto; Cordes, Thorben
    Far-field optical microscopy using focused light is an important tool in a number of scientific disciplines including chemical, (bio)physical and biomedical research, particularly with respect to the study of living cells and organisms. Unfortunately, the applicability of the optical microscope is limited, since the diffraction of light imposes limitations on the spatial resolution of the image. Consequently the details of, for example, cellular protein distributions, can be visualized only to a certain extent. Fortunately, recent years have witnessed the development of 'super-resolution' far-field optical microscopy (nanoscopy) techniques such as stimulated emission depletion (STED), ground state depletion (GSD), reversible saturated optical (fluorescence) transitions (RESOLFT), photoactivation localization microscopy (PALM), stochastic optical reconstruction microscopy (STORM), structured illumination microscopy (SIM) or saturated structured illumination microscopy (SSIM), all in one way or another addressing the problem of the limited spatial resolution of far-field optical microscopy. While SIM achieves a two-fold improvement in spatial resolution compared to conventional optical microscopy, STED, RESOLFT, PALM/STORM, or SSIM have all gone beyond, pushing the limits of optical image resolution to the nanometer scale. Consequently, all super-resolution techniques open new avenues of biomedical research. Because the field is so young, the potential capabilities of different super-resolution microscopy approaches have yet to be fully explored, and uncertainties remain when considering the best choice of methodology. Thus, even for experts, the road to the future is sometimes shrouded in mist. The super-resolution optical microscopy roadmap of Journal of Physics D: Applied Physics addresses this need for clarity. It provides guidance to the outstanding questions through a collection of short review articles from experts in the field, giving a thorough discussion on the concepts underlying super-resolution optical microscopy, the potential of different approaches, the importance of label optimization (such as reversible photoswitchable proteins) and applications in which these methods will have a significant impact.
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    Background Reduction in STED-FCS Using a Bivortex Phase Mask
    (Washington, DC : ACS Publications, 2020) Barbotin, Aurélien; Urbančič, Iztok; Galiani, Silvia; Eggeling, Christian; Booth, Martin
    Fluorescence correlation spectroscopy (FCS) is a valuable tool to study the molecular dynamics in living cells. When used together with a super-resolution stimulated emission depletion (STED) microscope, STED-FCS can measure diffusion processes on the nanoscale in living cells. In two-dimensional (2D) systems like the cellular plasma membrane, a ring-shaped depletion focus is most commonly used to increase the lateral resolution, leading to more than 25-fold decrease in the observation volume, reaching the relevant scale of supramolecular arrangements. However, STED-FCS faces severe limitations when measuring diffusion in three dimensions (3D), largely due to the spurious background contributions from undepleted areas of the excitation focus that reduce the signal quality and ultimately limit the resolution. In this paper, we investigate how different STED confinement modes can mitigate this issue. By simulations as well as experiments with fluorescent probes in solution and in cells, we demonstrate that the coherent-hybrid (CH) depletion pattern created by a bivortex phase mask reduces background most efficiently and thus provides superior signal quality under comparable reduction of the observation volume. Featuring also the highest robustness to common optical aberrations, CH-STED can be considered the method of choice for reliable STED-FCS-based investigations of 3D diffusion on the subdiffraction scale. Copyright © 2020 American Chemical Society.
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    Aggregation and mobility of membrane proteins interplay with local lipid order in the plasma membrane of T cells
    (Chichester : Wiley, 2021) Urbančič, Iztok; Schiffelers, Lisa; Jenkins, Edward; Gong, Weijian; Santos, Ana Mafalda; Schneider, Falk; O'Brien-Ball, Caitlin; Vuong, Mai Tuyet; Ashman, Nicole; Sezgin, Erdinc; Eggeling, Christian
    To disentangle the elusive lipid-protein interactions in T-cell activation, we investigate how externally imposed variations in mobility of key membrane proteins (T-cell receptor [TCR], kinase Lck, and phosphatase CD45) affect the local lipid order and protein colocalisation. Using spectral imaging with polarity-sensitive membrane probes in model membranes and live Jurkat T cells, we find that partial immobilisation of proteins (including TCR) by aggregation or ligand binding changes their preference towards a more ordered lipid environment, which can recruit Lck. Our data suggest that the cellular membrane is poised to modulate the frequency of protein encounters upon alterations of their mobility, for example in ligand binding, which offers new mechanistic insight into the involvement of lipid-mediated interactions in membrane-hosted signalling events.