Methods and compositions for preparing biological specimens for microscopic analysis
AssigneeThe Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior University
InventorsKarl A. Deisseroth, Kwanghun Chung
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Abstract
Methods and compositions are provided for preparing a biological specimen for microscopic analysis. These methods find many uses, for example in medicine and research, e.g., to diagnose or monitor disease or graft transplantation, to study healthy or diseased tissue, to screen candidate agents for toxicity and efficacy in disease modification. Also provided are reagents, devices, kits and systems thereof that find use in practicing the subject methods.
Claims33
A method of preparing a biological tissue specimen for microscopic analysis, the method comprising:
- fixing a biological tissue specimen obtained from a mammal by contacting the biological tissue specimen with a fixation agent and a plurality of hydrogel subunits, thereby cross-linking the hydrogel subunits to biomolecules within the biological tissue specimen to produce biomolecule-bound hydrogel subunits;
- polymerizing the biomolecule-bound hydrogel subunits to form a hydrogel-embedded biological tissue specimen;
- and
- electrophoresing the hydrogel-embedded biological tissue specimen to remove a plurality of cellular components from the specimen and form a cleared hydrogel-embedded biological tissue specimen.
A method of preserving a biological tissue specimen, the method comprising:
- fixing a biological tissue specimen obtained from a mammal by contacting the biological tissue specimen with a fixation agent and a plurality of hydrogel subunits, thereby cross-linking the hydrogel subunits to biomolecules within the biological tissue specimen to produce biomolecule-bound hydrogel subunits;
- polymerizing the biomolecule-bound hydrogel subunits to form a hydrogel-embedded biological tissue specimen;
- and
- electrophoresing the hydrogel-embedded biological tissue specimen to remove a plurality of cellular components from the specimen and form a cleared biological tissue specimen.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.