Gene transfection efficacy assessment of human cervical cancer cells using dual-mode fluorescence microendoscopy

We report a novel approach to quantitatively assess gene transfection efficacy using dual-modality microendoscopy that can simultaneously monitor both laser scanning reflectance and fluorescence imaging. The system uses a 500-μm-diameter coherent fiber bundle and permits 3.5-μm lateral resolution. Both reflectance and fluorescence images obtained from two silicon avalanche photodetectors are displaying at 1 Hz and processed automatically to calculate gene transfection efficiency (the ratio of fluorescent cells among the total cells). To validate the system performance we examined the expression of cyan fluorescent protein using human cervical cancer cells (HeLa) in four commercially available reagents. The result was compared with that using a high-resolution bench-top microscope.