Laboratory of General Biochemistry and Physical Pharmacy

Development of Advanced Light Microscopy methods for functional imaging

Transport of drugs and nanomaterials through biomaterials and tissues is an important issue in drug delivery. To optimize (nano)material design, methods are needed to accurately measure transport phenomena of molecules and nanoparticles at the micrometer scale. To this end we have invested for more than ten years in the development of tailored light microscopy methods to measure molecular and nanoparticle mobility in situ. These include biophysical models for quantitative fluorescence recovery after photobleaching (FRAP), fluorescence correlation spectroscopy (FCS) and single particle tracking (SPT). In addition we have developed optofluidic devices for improved detection and imaging of nanoparticles.
Our extensive expertise on advance microscopy techniques is made available to other researchers through the Centre for Advanced Light Miscroscopy , a ‘Centre of Excellence’ of Ghent University.

Selected key publications:

  • Xiong R., Vandenbroucke R.E., Broos K., Brans T., Van Wonterghem E., Libert C., Demeester J., De Smedt S.C., Braeckmans K.. Sizing nanomaterials in bio-fluids by cFRAP enables protein aggregation measurements and diagnosis of bio-barrier permeability. Nature Communications, DOI 10.1038/NCOMMS12982 (2016).
  • Lorén N., Hagman J., Jonasson J.K., Deschout H., Bernin D., Cella Zanacchi F., Diaspro A., McNally J.G., Ameloot M., Smisdomh N., Nydén M., Hermansson A.M., Rudemo M., Braeckmans K. Fluorescence recovery after photobleaching in material and life sciences: putting theory into practice. Q. Rev. Biophys. 48, 323-387 (2015).
  • Deschout H., Cella Zanacchi F., Mlodzianoski M., Diaspro A., Bewersdorf J., Hess S.T., Braeckmans K. Precisely and accurately localizing single emitters in fluorescence microscopy. Nature Methods 11, 253-266 (2014).
  • Braeckmans K., Buyens K., Bouquet W., Vervaet C., Joye P., De Vos F., Plawinski L., Doeuvre L., Angles-Cano E., Sanders N.N., Demeester J., De Smedt S.C. Sizing nanomatter in biological fluids by fluorescence Single Particle Tracking. Nano Letters 10, 4435-4442 (2010).

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