Digitized by Kansas Correctional Industries

No description available.

No description available.

As a high-resolution wide-field near-surface microscopy, total internal reflection fluorescence microscopy (TIRFM) has been widely applied for the study of biomolecules. Unlike those costly, sample consuming and time consuming traditional detection assays, the application of TIRFM enable the direct quantification of biomolecules in a sample pretreatment and enrichment free fashion. Taking advantages of the TIRFM imaging system, in this thesis we have applied the TIRFM imaging system to directly quantify the content of different cancer associated biomarkers. Four different detection approaches for direct cancer biomarkers quantification with the aid of TIRFM were herein presented respectively. In Chapter 2, a direct quantification of nasopharyngeal carcinoma associated miRNAs was described. In the assay, five different miRNAs were chosen as the target analytes, which hybridized with the synthetic complementary LNA, probe in solution. The duplex was labeled with intercalating fluorescence dye YOYO-1 and the signal was then detected by the TIRFM-EMCCD imaging system. The LNA probe exhibited a high binding affinity towards the complementary target miRNAs and a limit of detection of 8 pM was achieved. Since the LOD is far below the reported concentration of miRNAs found in body fluids, this developed assay is of high potential to serve as a tool for non-invasive detection of miRNAs for early disease diagnosis. In Chapter 3, an advanced single-molecule based assay for direct circulating miRNAs detection was developed. The assay was demonstrated to be capable of differentiating the expression of a nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) up-regulator hsa-mir-205 (mir-205) in serum collected from patients of different stages of NPC. To overcome the background matrix interference in serum, locked nucleic acid modified molecular beacon (LNA/MB) was applied as the detection probe to hybridize, capture and detect target mir-205 in serum matrix with enhanced sensitivity and specificity. A detection limit of 500 fM was achieved. The as-developed method was capable of differentiating NPC stages by the level of mir-205 quantified in serum with only 10 μL of serum and the whole assay can be completed in an hour. The experimental results agreed well with reported and while the quantity of mir-205 determined by our assay was found comparable to that of quantitative reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR), supporting that this assay can be served as a promising non-invasive detection tool for early NPC diagnosis, monitoring and staging. In chapter 4, a self-assembled protein nanofibril based online pre-concentrating sensor was developed. This solution-based hybridization assay was applied to quantified the amount of target miRNAs, mir-196a. Biotinylated locked nucleic acid (LNA) of complimentary sequence was served as the probe to capture the target miRNA analyte. The target hybridization duplex was immobilized on the backbone of the nanofibril through the biotin-streptavidin interaction. The quantification was achieved by the fluorescence intensity measured with total internal reflection fluorescence microscopy. A detection limit of 1 pM was achieved with trace amount of sample consumption. This assay showed efficient single-base mismatch discrimination. The applicability of quantifying circulating mir-196a in both normal and cancer patient’s serums was also demonstrated. In chapter 5, a magnetic nanoparticles based sandwich immunosensor with carbazole-based cyanine as the fluorescence labeling dye for the direct quantification of prostate cancer related antigen, PSA, was developed. Taking benefit of the magnetic property of the nanoparticles, the target sandwich immunocomposites can be easily online separated from the sample matrix. The as-developed assay can efficiently discriminate the target PSA from other disease related antigens and achieve a LOD of 400 fM (13 pg/mL) and a LOQ of 2 pM (0.66 ng/mL). As the whole detection assay can be completed in 1 h with only 10 μL of sample, this assay is fast and cost effective and of high potential for early disease and cancer diagnosis, staging and monitoring

Thesis (M.S.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 1966. / eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Bibliography: l. 77-84.

Two-photon microscopy is often used in biological imaging due to its optical sectioning and depth penetration capabilities. These characteristics have made two-photon microscopy especially useful for neurobiological studies where imaging a volume at single cell resolution is typically required. This dissertation focuses on the optimization of two-photon excited fluorescence for volumetric imaging of biological samples, with special attention to imaging the mouse brain. Chapter 2 studies wavefront manipulation as a way of optimizing two-photon excited fluorescence. We show, through numerical simulations and experiments, that the magnitude of the two-photon fluorescence signal originating from cell-sized objects can be used as a metric of beam quality. We also show that the cranial window used in mouse experiment is a major source of aberrations, which can readily be represented in the Zernike basis. Finally, we implement a modal wavefront optimization scheme that optimizes the wavefront based entirely on the magnitude of the fluorescence. Along with this scheme, Zernike functions are found to be a useful basis for correcting aberrations encountered in mouse brain imaging while the Hadamard basis is found to be useful for scattering compensation. Corrections performed in mouse brain using Zernike functions are found to be valid over hundreds of microns, allowing a single correction to be applied to a whole volume. Finally, we show that the wavefront correction system can double as a wavefront encoding system for experiments that require custom point-spread-functions. Chapter 3 aims to significantly improve the volume imaging rate of two-photon microscopy. The imaging speed is improved by combining two-photon excitation with scanning confocally-aligned planar excitation microscopy (SCAPE). Numerical simulations, analytical arguments, and experiments reveal that the standard method of combining nano-joule pulses with 80 MHz repetition rates is inadequate for two-photon light-sheet excitation. We use numerical simulations and experiments to explore the possibility of achieving fast volumetric imaging using line and sheet excitation and find that the sheet excitation scheme is more promising. Given that two-photon excitation requires high photon-flux-densities near the focus, achieving high enough fluorescence has to be balanced with restrictions placed by saturation, photodamage, photobleaching and sample heating effects. Finally, we experimentally study light sheet excitation at various pulse repetition rates with femtosecond pulses and find that repetition rates near 100 kHz allow imaging of nonbiological samples of ~200x300x300 μm^3 volume at 20 volumes per second while balancing the above constraints. This work paves the way for achieving fast, volumetric two-photon imaging of the mouse brain.

acase@tulane.edu / Current microscopy-based tissue diagnostics, particularly hematoxylin and eosin (H&E) histology, requires multiple complex tissue processing steps: fixation, paraffin embedding, microtome sectioning, dying the tissue, and imaging individual slides through a bright field microscope. The time and labor-intensive result of this process makes it unsuitable for patient point-of-care evaluation. Therefore, many bedside procedures are completed without efficient real-time analysis of tissue adequacy and diagnostic results are unnecessarily delayed. Additionally, research experiments that require information regarding changes to tissue morphology or function before proceeding to the next experimental phase are severely interrupted by histology processing in their workflow. Fluorescence histology, which relies on rapid fluorescent staining of tissue, optical sectioning microscopy, and image processing for digital viewing, can provide an inexpensive, non-destructive, 3-dimensional, and fast alternative to traditional histology and point-of-care screening protocols. The objective of this work is to further advance the concept of “fluorescence histology,” in which traditional histopathology preparation methods are replaced by optical-sectioning (in lieu of physical sectioning), sensitive and flexible fluorescence-based contrast (in lieu of chromophore-based contrast), and computational strategies to replicate traditional color-schemes. In this work, we demonstrate the development and use of a fluorescent analogue to H&E on fixed and frozen tissue sections and fresh human biopsies. This fluorescent analogue, DRAQ5 & eosin, is compared against the current single-agent, monochrome fluorescence histology system, and their effects on diagnostic downstream molecular analyses, including quantitative-PCR and immunohistochemistry, is evaluated. We create a methodology to develop and characterize fluorescent analogues for any histological stain, with demonstration using Masson’s Trichrome and Periodic Acid-Schiff, enabling the expansion of fluorescence histology for multiple applications. This work demonstrates the ability to improve point-of-care pathology and research by replacing destructive, incomplete, and time-consuming histology with fluorescence histology, which preserves the tissue for later analysis or experiments while providing accurate and rapid histology assessment. / 1 / Katherine Elfer

Bacteria are implicated in endodontic infections. They not only infect the root canal lumen but also invade the dentinal tubules where they may remain untouched by contemporary chemomechanical preparation during root canal therapy. The contentious issue is whether the bacteria within these tubules contribute to secondary infections. Many studies have shown that clinicians fail to completely eradicate them during root canal therapy. At present there are no techniques available to detect the effectiveness of the current chemomechanical treatment regime within dentinal tubules. It is difficult to detect bacteria within the dentinal tubules. Culturing techniques have been used routinely as they are versatile and easy to use. However, they are unable to show the distribution of the bacteria within the dentinal tubules. Scanning electron microscopy, on the other hand, shows detailed surface structure in association with bacteria. Histological examination of root dentine specimens under the light microscope also shows the distribution of bacteria within the specimen but not viability. The dilemma posed by these existing techniques is that the results offer limited information; either demonstrating bacterial viability or bacterial distribution within specimens. No techniques able to show both the viability and the distribution of bacteria within the dentinal tubules have been reported to date. Fluorescent stains, in particular SYTO�9 and propidium iodide (LIVE/DEAD� Baclight[TM] viability kit, Molecular Probes Inc., Eugene, Oregon), have made it possible not only to stain bacteria but to differentiate live and dead bacteria. The combination of these two stains has yet to be applied to dental hard tissue in situ and they provide the basis for this investigation. The aim of this study was to evaluate the potential of the LIVE/DEAD� Baclight[TM] stains in conjuction with confocal laser scanning microscopy in the development of a technique to evaluate the viability and distribution of bacteria within dentinal tubules. This was extended to demonstrate the application of this technique by examining three different means of root canal disinfection both qualitatively and quantitatively. An important aspect of this study was to maintain bacterial viability, as well as to get maximum bacterial invasion into dentinal tubules. Results indicated that when the root canals were instrumented with Protaper� files and then irrigated with sodium hypochlorite (NaOCl) and ethylene diaminetetraacetic acid with cetrimide (EDTAC), there was more bacterial invasion into the dentinal tubules than when the root canals were only irrigated with NaOCl and EDTAC. Daily replenishments of nutrients resulted in deeper bacterial invasion into the dentinal tubules. Bacteria colonized the dentinal tubules up to a distance of 594 � 133 [mu]m from the canal. In the untreated tubules, 96 � 4 % of bacteria remained viable (green-fluorescent), whereas the Amoxicillin-treated tubules contained 94 � 6 % dead (red-fluorescent) bacteria. The calcium hydroxide-treated tubules resulted in 92 � 7 % bacterial death while the laser-treated tubules contained 81 � 12 % dead cells, frequently displaying an inner zone of dead cells surrounded by an outer zone of viable cells. The application of the fluorescent stains combined with confocal microscopy offers a new method for assessing the in vitro efficacy of root canal disinfection regimens.

Thesis (M.S.)--University of Nevada, Reno, 2005. / "December, 2005." Includes bibliographical references (leaves 50-53). Online version available on the World Wide Web.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--West Virginia University, 2006. / Title from document title page. Document formatted into pages; contains xii, 146 p. : ill. (some col.). Includes abstract. Includes bibliographical references (p. 134-146).