Immunofluorescence Staining and High-Resolution Confocal Microscopy of CRISPR/Cas9-Mediated CENP-E Knockout HeLa Cells

To begin, take a plate of wild type and CENP-E mutant HeLa cells growing on a cover slip. Fix the cells with 4%paraformaldehyde and PBS fixative solution at room temperature for 10 minutes. Then, immerse in PBS for two rounds of five minutes each.

Next, permeabilize the cells with 0.25%Triton X-100 and PBS at room temperature for 10 minutes. Immerse them in PBS for two rounds of five minutes each. Proceed to block the cells with 1%BSA PBS with 0.1%Tween 20 at room temperature for one hour.

Dilute the primary antibodies in 1%BSA and PBST and incubate the samples at four degrees Celsius for 12 hours. Discard the primary antibody solutions. Then, rinse the cells three times for five minutes each with PBS.

Add diluted secondary antibodies to the cell and incubate at room temperature for two hours. Next, discard the secondary antibodies. Then rinse the cells with PBS three times for five minutes each.

Stain the nuclei using DAPI at room temperature for five minutes. Mount the slides with the mounting medium and seal them with nail polish. Observe the fluorescence images using a scanning confocal microscope, fitted with a 63 times magnification, 1.40 numerical aperture objective, and record them for further analysis.

Immunofluorescence staining of the control and CENP-E mutant groups showed that the fluorescence intensities of the CENP-E proteins were completely knocked out in the CENP-E mutant Clone 1 cells and significantly decreased in CENP-E mutant Clone 3 cells. The ratios of metaphase cells with chromosome misalignment increased in Clones 1 and 3 compared to the control cells. Meanwhile, the ratios of metaphase cells increased significantly in Clone 1 cells and Clone 3 cells.

In addition, the ratio of interphase cells slightly increased in Clone 1 and 3 groups after CENP-E deletion, compared with the control group. The rates of prophase, anaphase, and telophase cells were slightly decreased after CENP-E deletion, whereas the rates of metaphase cells increased after CENP-E deletion.