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    Curr Protoc Cell Biol. 2008 Jun;Chapter 4:Unit 4.18.

    Fluorescence imaging techniques for studying Drosophila embryo development.

    Mavrakis M, Rikhy R, Lilly M, Lippincott-Schwartz J.

    Institute of Developmental Biology of Marseille-Luminy, UMR6216 CNRS-Université de la Méditerranée, Marseille, France.

    This unit describes fluorescence-based techniques for noninvasive imaging of development in living Drosophila embryos, discussing considerations for fluorescent imaging within living embryos and providing protocols for generation of flies expressing fluorescently tagged proteins and for preparation of embryos for fluorescent imaging. The unit details time-lapse confocal imaging of live embryos and discusses optimizing image acquisition and performing three-dimensional imaging. Finally, the unit provides a variety of specific methods for optical highlighting of specific subsets of fluorescently tagged proteins and organelles in the embryo, including fluorescence recovery after photobleaching (FRAP), fluorescence loss in photobleaching (FLIP), and photoactivation techniques, permitting analysis of specific movements of fluorescently tagged proteins within cells. These protocols, together with the relative ease of generating transgenic animals and the ability to express tagged proteins in specific tissues or at specific developmental times, provide powerful means for examining in vivo behavior of any tagged protein in embryos in myriad mutant backgrounds. Copyright 2008 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

    PMID: 18551421 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

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