Virology

Viruses cause a diverse array of infectious diseases in humans, including the common cold, chicken pox, AIDS and SARS, just to name a few. Understanding how viruses interact with and proliferate within host cells, as well as how viruses evade or co-opt the functioning immune system, is of central importance for developing therapies to fight viral diseases. Using the multiparametric image-based approach enabled by the ImageStream, it is possible to identify virally infected cells and measure the impact of that infection on signal transduction cascades, cell morphology and cell death.

Co-localization of CpGB to lysosomes and endosomes in primary plasmacytoid dendritic cells

Binding, internalization, and colocalization to lysosomes of CpGB by plasmacytoid dendritic cells (pDC) is measured using the ImageStream. In combination with immunophenotyping, spatial resolution and intensities of lysosomes (green) are correlated with CpGB (red) in pDC (orange). This data highlights several strengths of the ImageStream: 1) combination of immunophenotyping (pDC identification via fluorescent intensity staining) with image correlation and internalization analysis, allowing measurement of colocalization and internalization of molecules within specific subsets. 2) ability to measure these events in small, primary cells with small cytoplasmic compartments. For the compete time course of endosome and lysosome co-localization, see the application note.

HIV-specific translocation of NFAT

HIV-specific nuclear localization of NFAT was measured in HIV-experienced T cells from peripheral blood of HIV+ patients. HIVgag peptide specifically stimulates NFAT (green) to move to the nucleus (red) in HIV-tetramer positive cells (orange). The Similarity score correlates DRAQ5 nuclear stain with the NFAT signal. The higher the Similarity score, the more translocation is visualized in the example images from each quadrant.