New HYBRiD Technique for Making Tissue Transparent Could Speed the Study of Many Diseases
upstart writes:
New HYBRiD Technique for Making Tissue Transparent Could Speed the Study of Many Diseases:
[...] This is a simple and universal tissue-clearing technique for studies of large body parts or even entire animals," says study senior author Li Ye, PhD, assistant professor of neuroscience at Scripps Research.
Tissue-clearing involves the use of solvents to remove molecules that make tissue opaque (such as fat), rendering the tissue optically transparent-while keeping most proteins and structures in place. Scientists commonly use genetically encoded or antibody-linked fluorescent beacons to mark active genes or other molecules of interest in a lab animal, and tissue-clearing in principle allows these beacons to be imaged all at once across the entire animal.
[...] The new method devised by Ye and his team uses a sequential combination of organic solvents and water-based detergents, and makes use of water-based hydrogels to protect those molecules within the tissue that need to be preserved. It often does not require the pumping of solvents through the sample.
Journal Reference:
Nudell, Victoria, Wang, Yu, Pang, Zhengyuan, et al. HYBRiD: hydrogel-reinforced DISCO for clearing mammalian bodies [open], Nature Methods (DOI: 10.1038/s41592-022-01427-0)
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