Open AccessLabel-retention expansion microscopy
Author(s) -
Xiaoyu Shi,
Qi Li,
Zhipeng Dai,
Arthur A Tran,
Siyu Feng,
Alexander Ramirez,
Zixi Lin,
Xiaomeng Wang,
Tracy T. Chow,
Jiapei Chen,
Dhivya Kumar,
Andrew McColloch,
Jeremy F. Reiter,
Eric Huang,
Ian B. Seiple,
Bo Huang
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
the journal of cell biology/the journal of cell biology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 5.414
H-Index - 380
eISSN - 1540-8140
pISSN - 0021-9525
DOI - 10.1083/jcb.202105067
Subject(s) - microscopy , materials science , fluorescence microscope , biomedical engineering , biological system , biophysics , biology , fluorescence , optics , physics , medicine
Expansion microscopy (ExM) increases the effective resolving power of any microscope by expanding the sample with swellable hydrogel. Since its invention, ExM has been successfully applied to a wide range of cell, tissue, and animal samples. Still, fluorescence signal loss during polymerization and digestion limits molecular-scale imaging using ExM. Here, we report the development of label-retention ExM (LR-ExM) with a set of trifunctional anchors that not only prevent signal loss but also enable high-efficiency labeling using SNAP and CLIP tags. We have demonstrated multicolor LR-ExM for a variety of subcellular structures. Combining LR-ExM with superresolution stochastic optical reconstruction microscopy (STORM), we have achieved molecular resolution in the visualization of polyhedral lattice of clathrin-coated pits in situ.