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Vibrational imaging of newly synthesized proteins in live cells by stimulated Raman scattering microscopy.

ABSTRACT: Synthesis of new proteins, a key step in the central dogma of molecular biology, has been a major biological process by which cells respond rapidly to environmental cues in both physiological and pathological conditions. However, the selective visualization of a newly synthesized proteome in living systems with subcellular resolution has proven to be rather challenging, despite the extensive efforts along the lines of fluorescence staining, autoradiography, and mass spectrometry. Herein, we report an imaging technique to visualize nascent proteins by harnessing the emerging stimulated Raman scattering (SRS) microscopy coupled with metabolic incorporation of deuterium-labeled amino acids. As a first demonstration, we imaged newly synthesized proteins in live mammalian cells with high spatial-temporal resolution without fixation or staining. Subcellular compartments with fast protein turnover in HeLa and HEK293T cells, and newly grown neurites in differentiating neuron-like N2A cells, are clearly identified via this imaging technique. Technically, incorporation of deuterium-labeled amino acids is minimally perturbative to live cells, whereas SRS imaging of exogenous carbon-deuterium bonds (C-D) in the cell-silent Raman region is highly sensitive, specific, and compatible with living systems. Moreover, coupled with label-free SRS imaging of the total proteome, our method can readily generate spatial maps of the quantitative ratio between new and total proteomes. Thus, this technique of nonlinear vibrational imaging of stable isotope incorporation will be a valuable tool to advance our understanding of the complex spatial and temporal dynamics of newly synthesized proteome in vivo.

SUBMITTER: Wei L

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3710790 | biostudies-literature | 2013 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Vibrational imaging of newly synthesized proteins in live cells by stimulated Raman scattering microscopy.

Wei Lu L Yu Yong Y Shen Yihui Y Wang Meng C MC Min Wei W

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 20130624 28

Synthesis of new proteins, a key step in the central dogma of molecular biology, has been a major biological process by which cells respond rapidly to environmental cues in both physiological and pathological conditions. However, the selective visualization of a newly synthesized proteome in living systems with subcellular resolution has proven to be rather challenging, despite the extensive efforts along the lines of fluorescence staining, autoradiography, and mass spectrometry. Herein, we repo ...[more]

PMID: 23798434

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Project description:Traditionally, molecules are analyzed in a test tube. Taking biochemistry as an example, the majority of our knowledge about cellular content comes from analysis of fixed cells or tissue homogenates using tools such as immunoblotting and liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry. These tools can indicate the presence of molecules but do not provide information on their location or interaction with each other in real time, restricting our understanding of the functions of the molecule under study. For real-time imaging of labeled molecules in live cells, fluorescence microscopy is the tool of choice. Fluorescent labels, however, are too bulky for small molecules such as fatty acids, amino acids, and cholesterol. These challenges highlight a critical need for development of chemical imaging platforms that allow in situ or in vivo analysis of molecules. Vibrational spectroscopy based on spontaneous Raman scattering is widely used for label-free analysis of chemical content in cells and tissues. However, the Raman process is a weak effect, limiting its application for fast chemical imaging of a living system. With high imaging speed and 3D spatial resolution, coherent Raman scattering microscopy is enabling a new approach for real-time vibrational imaging of single cells in a living system. In most experiments, coherent Raman processes involve two excitation fields denoted as pump at ωp and Stokes at ωs. When the beating frequency between the pump and Stokes fields (ωp - ωs) is resonant with a Raman-active molecular vibration, four major coherent Raman scattering processes occur simultaneously, namely, coherent anti-Stokes Raman scattering (CARS) at (ωp - ωs) + ωp, coherent Stokes Raman scattering (CSRS) at ωs - (ωp - ωs), stimulated Raman gain (SRG) at ωs, and stimulated Raman loss (SRL) at ωp. In SRG, the Stokes beam experiences a gain in intensity, whereas in SRL, the pump beam experiences a loss. Both SRG and SRL belong to stimulated Raman scattering (SRS), in which the energy difference between the pump and Stokes fields is transferred to the molecule for vibrational excitation. The SRS signal appears at the same wavelengths as the excitation fields and is commonly extracted through a phase-sensitive detection scheme. The detected intensity change because of a Raman transition is proportional to Im[χ(3)]IpIs, where χ(3) represents the third-order nonlinear susceptibility, Ip and Is stand for the intensity of the pump and Stokes fields. In this Account, we discuss the most recent advances in the technical development and enabling applications of SRS microscopy. Compared to CARS, the SRS contrast is free of nonresonant background. Moreover, the SRS intensity is linearly proportional to the density of target molecules in focus. For single-frequency imaging, an SRS microscope offers a speed that is ∼1000 times faster than a line-scan Raman microscope and 10,000 times faster than a point-scan Raman microscope. It is important to emphasize that SRS and spontaneous Raman scattering are complementary to each other. Spontaneous Raman spectroscopy covers the entire window of molecular vibrations, which allows extraction of subtleties via multivariate analysis. SRS offers the speed advantage by focusing on either a single Raman band or a defined spectral window of target molecules. Integrating single-frequency SRS imaging and spontaneous Raman spectroscopy on a single platform allows quantitative compositional analysis of objects inside single live cells.

Dataset Information

Vibrational imaging of newly synthesized proteins in live cells by stimulated Raman scattering microscopy.

Publications

Vibrational imaging of newly synthesized proteins in live cells by stimulated Raman scattering microscopy.

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