Visualizing nitric oxide in live cells by confocal laser scanning microscopy

【摘要】：Nitric oxide(NO) is an im portant molecular involved in a wide range of physiological and pathological processes.Research has dem onstrated that NO plays a contradictory role dependent on the concentration of NO.Therefore,measuring the concentration of NO in living cells is essential to understanding whether NO functions as toxic or protective substance.In this paper,we presented an opti cal method that utilized a nitric oxide fluorescence probe to characterize the concentration of NO in HeLa cells and rat dorsal root ganglion(DRG) ne urons by confocal laser scanning microscopy.In addition,we o ptimized the measurement conditions for low photobleaching and phototoxicity.The results showed that there were differences between HeLa cells and DRG neurons on the concentration of NO.