Direct confocal acquisition of fluorescence from X-gal staining on thick tissue sections
Open Access
- 14 October 2013
- journal article
- research article
- Published by Springer Science and Business Media LLC in Scientific Reports
- Vol. 3 (1), srep02937
- https://doi.org/10.1038/srep02937
Abstract
X-gal staining is a common procedure used in the histochemical monitoring of gene expression by light microscopy. However, this procedure does not permit the direct confocal acquisition of images, thus preventing the identification of labelled cells on the depth (Z) axis of tissue sections and leading sometimes to erroneous conclusions in co-localization and gene expression studies. Here we report a technique, based on X-gal fluorescence emission and mathematically-based optical correction, to obtain high quality fluorescence confocal images. This method, combined with immunofluorescence, makes it possible to unequivocally identify X-gal-labelled cells in tissue sections, emerging as a valuable tool in gene expression and cell tracing analysis.This publication has 15 references indexed in Scilit:
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