Fluorogenic Compounds and Their Use In Biological Systems

KSU.322

Abstract:

 Researchers at Stanford and Kent State have developed a broad new class of photoactivatable and fluorogenic compounds for ultrasensitive detection and imaging single molecules in cells.  These compounds can be made fluorescent in a cell in a controllable way using a chemical reaction or light.  Because the precursor molecules do not produce emission when pumped they do not produce background and can be imaged without washing.  The compounds can also participate in fluorogenic photoaffinity labeling, both becoming fluorescent and forming a covalent bond with a nearby bimolecular upon illumination.  In addition, they can be used to achieve imaging beyond the diffraction limit of a conventional optical microscope.  This technology could be used for a wide range of biological and medical imaging, including array readout, gene sequencing, medical diagnostics, and detection of proteins, protein-protein interactions, glycans, or oligonucleotides.

Applications:

• Research- reagents for single-molecule detection

• Diagnostics -detection reagent.

Advantages:

• Single-molecule imaging - fluorophore is photostable enough to be imaged at the single-molecule level
• Greatly reduced background- molecules do not fluoresce unless activated
• Reduced need for washing - faster results
• Long-wavelength emission- allows easy detection in the cell at wavelengths where the cellular autofluorescence is not excited
• Bright-emit millions of photons before photobleaching
• Visualize dynamic phenomena- no delay in observation from washout procedure
• Imaging beyond the diffraction limit of a conventional optical microscope

Inventors:  Na Liu, Samuel Lord, William Moerner, Reichel Samuel, Robert Twieg

Licensing Contact

Suguna Rachakonda

Associate Director, Technology Commercialization

Office: 330-672-3553  Fax: 330-672-7991

Email: srachako@kent.edu