Lipid raft detecting in membranes of live erythrocytes

The fluorescent probe N-(BODIPY(®)-FL-propionyl)-neuraminosyl-GM(1) (BODIPY-GM(1)) was used to detect lipid rafts in living red blood cells (RBCs) membranes. The probe was detected with fluorescence video microscopy and was found to be uniformly distributed along plasma membrane at room temperature (23°C). At 4°C some probe clearly phase-separated to yield detectable bright spots that were smaller than spatial resolution. As measured by spectrofluorometry, in addition to a major fluorescence peak caused by emissions from monomers, the probe exhibited a red-shifted peak that is characteristic of a BODIPY fluorophore at high local concentrations, indicating that some probe had clustered. Red-shifted fluorescence was the greatest at 4°C, intermediate at 23°C, and the smallest at 37°C. Treating the RBCs with methyl-β-cyclodextrin to remove cholesterol eliminated the red-shifted peak. This strongly indicates that the presence of cholesterol was essential for phase separation of the probe. Fluorometry experiments indicate that rafts exist at 23°C and at 37°C, even though the membrane appears to be uniform at the resolution of microscope. The distinct GM(1) patches distributed over entire membrane of the erythrocytes were observed at both 23°C and at 37°C in RBCs stained with Alexa FL 647 cholera toxin subunit B conjugate (CTB-A647 ). Based on both fluorometry and fluorescence microscopy, some rafts clearly exist at 37°C.