AN EASY method of labelling cellular structures without transfection agents is now available from Amsbio. The company says its lentiviral particles allow the direct visualisation of organelles and other internal cell structures, without manipulation.
Real-time visualisation conventionally requires the use of plasmids as organelle markers. This approach is effective, but is limited in that the labelling is only transitory. Lentiviral particles produce long-term labels, and also allow direct visualisation of cell nuclei, membranes, mitotic chromosomes and other targets of interest.
The particles employ three colours of fluorescent tag to fuse to specific proteins, allowing these to be easily visualised. Using this multicolour approach with GFP, RFP, and CFP tags enables three different structures to be targeted and independently viewed in a single experiment.
Tags can be directed towards interphase plasma membrane, chromatin, microtubule, endosome, golgi, endoplasmic reticulum, mitochondria, lysosome, cytoplasm and peroxisome in many types of cell including primary cells and stem cells.