Review abstract


Nature Chemical Biology 3, 92 - 98 (2007)
Published online: 18 January 2007 | doi:10.1038/nchembio855

Imaging single events at the cell membrane

Jyoti K Jaiswal1 & Sanford M Simon1


The ability to sense and respond to the environment is a hallmark of living systems. These processes occur at the levels of the organism, cells and individual molecules. Sensing of extracellular changes could result in a structural or chemical alteration in a molecule, which could in turn trigger a cascade of intracellular signals or regulated trafficking of molecules at the cell surface. These and other such processes allow cells to sense and respond to environmental changes. Often, these changes and the responses to them are spatially and/or temporally localized, and visualization of such events necessitates the use of high-resolution imaging approaches. Here we discuss optical imaging approaches and tools for imaging individual events at the cell surface with improved speed and resolution.

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  1. The Rockefeller University, 1230 York Avenue, New York, New York 10021, USA.

Correspondence to: Sanford M Simon1 e-mail: simon@rockefeller.edu



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