Expansion microscopy of the chick embryo neural tube to overcome molecular crowding at the centrosomes-cilia

Abstract

We describe an optimized protocol for application of expansion microscopy (ExM) on chick neural tube (NT) which enables different oriented nanoscale resolution imaging of the centrosomes/cilia. We explain embryo NT transversal sections and open-book preparations, immunohistochemistry for labeling, and sample preparation for 5-fold tissue expansion. Further, we detail sample orientation and Fast Airyscan confocal acquisition and show that NT-ExM retains fluorescence signals and overcomes biomolecules crowding in structural features that to date were only imaged with electron microscopy on tissues.

Reference:

Wilmerding, A., Espana-Bonilla, P., Giakoumakis, N. N., & Saade, M. (2023). Expansion microscopy of the chick embryo neural tube to overcome molecular crowding at the centrosomes-cilia. STAR Protocols, 4(1), 101997. doi: 10.1016/j.xpro.2022.101997