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Updated: May 26, 2025

High-resolution Spatiotemporal Analysis of Receptor Dynamics by Single-molecule Fluorescence Microscopy
Published on: July 25, 2014
Principles and Design of Molecular Tools for Sensing and Perturbing Cell Surface Receptor Activity
Jennifer Sescil1,2, Steven M Havens1,2, Wenjing Wang1,2,3,4
1Department of Chemistry, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109, United States.
Abstract:
Cell-surface receptors are vital for controlling numerous cellular processes with their dysregulation being linked to disease states. Therefore, it is necessary to develop tools to study receptors and the signaling pathways they control. This Review broadly describes molecular approaches that enable 1) the visualization of receptors to determine their localization and distribution; 2) sensing receptor activation with permanent readouts as well as readouts in real time; and 3) perturbing receptor activity and mimicking receptor-controlled processes to learn more about these processes. Together, these tools have provided valuable insight into fundamental receptor biology and helped to characterize therapeutics that target receptors.
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