Texas A&M University System Health Science Center

3 ARTICLES PUBLISHED IN JoVE

Biology

Visualization of Caenorhabditis elegans Cuticular Structures Using the Lipophilic Vital Dye DiI

¹Department of Molecular and Cellular Medicine, Texas A&M University System Health Science Center, College of Medicine

We present a method to visualize cuticle in live C. elegans using the red fluorescent lipophilic dye DiI (1,1'-dioctadecyl-3,3,3',3'-tetramethylindocarbocyanine perchlorate), which is commonly used in C. elegans to visualize environmentally exposed neurons. With this optimized protocol, alae and annular cuticular structures are stained by DiI and observed using compound microscopy.

Biology

RNAi Screening to Identify Postembryonic Phenotypes in C. elegans

Katherine K. Beifuss¹, Tina L. Gumienny¹

¹Department of Molecular and Cellular Medicine, Texas A&M University System Health Science Center

We describe a sensitized method to identify postembryonic regulators of protein expression and localization in C. elegans using an RNAi-based genomic screen and an integrated transgene that expresses a functional, fluorescently tagged protein.

Immunology and Infection

High-throughput Assay to Phenotype Salmonella enterica Typhimurium Association, Invasion, and Replication in Macrophages

Jing Wu¹, Roberta Pugh¹, Richard C. Laughlin¹, Helene Andrews-Polymenis², Michael McClelland³, Andreas J. Bäumler⁴, L. Garry Adams¹

¹Department of Veterinary Pathobiology, College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences, Texas A&M University, ²Department of Microbial and Molecular Pathogenesis, College of Medicine, Texas A&M University System Health Science Center, ³University of California, Irvine, ⁴Department of Medical Microbiology & Immunology, School of Medicine, University of California, Davis

A high-throughput assay to in vitro phenotype Salmonella or other bacterial association, invasion, and replication in phagocytic cells with high-throughput capacity was developed. The method was employed to evaluate Salmonella gene knockout mutant strains for their involvements in host-pathogen interactions.