August 2020 Newsletter: Fluorescent Membrane Probes

This newsletter describes the pros and cons of commonly used fluorescent membrane probes and provides an overview of the latest probe breakthroughs. Luminescent membrane probes delineate the periphery of a cell by binding close to or within the plasma membrane. There are, broadly speaking, five classes of membrane probes, which are; wheat germ agglutinin (WGA) conjugates, lipid conjugates, lipophilic dyes, covalent binding probes, and biophysical reporter probes. Recently, new fluorogenic probes have been developed including MemGlow™ (MemBright™ family), Flipper-TR5a and Nile Red-based probes, which bestow researchers unprecedented resolution of membrane structure and function, and with the latter  two acting as biophysical sensors.