Fluorescence Resonance Energy Transfer (FRET)

[Bishadi]

good read

Olympus FluoView Resource Center: FRET Introductory Concepts

The precise location and nature of the interactions between specific molecular species in living cells is of major interest in many areas of biological research, but investigations are often hampered by the limited resolution of the instruments employed to examine these phenomena. Conventional widefield fluorescence microscopy enables localization of fluorescently labeled molecules within the optical spatial resolution limits defined by the Rayleigh criterion, approximately 200 nanometers (0.2 micrometer). However, in order to understand the physical interactions between protein partners involved in a typical biomolecular process, the relative proximity of the molecules must be determined more precisely than diffraction-limited traditional optical imaging methods permit. The technique of fluorescence resonance energy transfer (more commonly referred to by the acronym FRET), when applied to optical microscopy, permits determination of the approach between two molecules within several nanometers (see Figure 1), a distance sufficiently close for molecular interactions to occur

The be a good field to get into for the thinking type

 

[Bishadi]

When the monoclonal antibody EP2-19G2 is combined with stilbene, a hydrocarbon commonly used in making dyes, it emits an intense blue light after exposure to ultraviolet light. While other antibody-stilbene complexes have also shown the ability to produce purple, blue-purple, and blue fluorescence after UV exposure, their fluorescent effect has been relatively weak and short lived.

“The luminescence produced by the EP2-19G2-stilbene complex lasts more than 400 times longer than that of stilbene on its own,” said Erik Debler, the first author of the new study and a former graduate student of Professor Ian Wilson’s laboratory at Scripps Research. “This is probably the longest luminescence lifetime that has ever been observed for stilbene and was totally unexpected, especially since stilbene is basically the E. coli of photochemistry, as it is extremely well characterized and understood.”
The fact that the EP2-19G2-stilbene complex emits a bright luminescence was first described in a Scripps Research study published in the October 13, 2000 edition (Volume 290, Number 5490) of the journal Science. The underlying mechanism had remained unknown until now

is this 2008? and february was 5 months ago.......

I wonder if all the universities across the world know "the underlying mechanism ".......?