NCMIR In The News
UCSD Scientist Roger Tsien Shares 2008 Nobel Prize in Chemistry
Dr. Tsien’s Research with NCMIR Ongoing
Caption: (left) Dividing Cells: Various fluorescent probes were used to highlight the cytoskeleton (orange), the Golgi Apparatus (green) and DNA (blue) in dividing cells in order to study their behavior during mitosis; (right) Purkinje Neuron: An image of the cerebellum from a transgenic mouse that was manipulated to express a green fluorescent protein in a subset of Purkinje Neurons.
The Nobel Prize Committee in Stockholm has awarded the 2008 Nobel Prize in Chemistry to distinguished University of California, San Diego Scientist Roger Tsien, Ph.D., professor of pharmacology, chemistry, and biochemistry, and a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator. Tsien shares the prize with Osamu Shimomura of the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole and Boston University School of Medicine and Martin Chalfie from Columbia University in New York. These pre-eminent scientists are honored for their discovery of Green Fluorescent Protein (GFP) and creating fluorescent molecules that can literally light up and track cell structures and dynamic processes. The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has called work with GFP “one of the most important tools used in contemporary bioscience.”
Dr. Tsien is a Co-Investigator at the National Center for Microscopy Imaging Research (NCMIR), directed by Dr. Mark Ellisman at the University of California San Diego. Dr. Tsien’s work has been critical to the capabilities of the center where so many of the images using Tsien’s fluorescent molecular probes have been generated. Dr. Tsien is a leader in the development of new indicator systems and their application to cell biology. He has been a driving force behind the NCMIR core efforts to develop improved labeling technologies for correlative light and electron microscopy.
Dr. Tsien pioneered a method of specifically labeling proteins of interest within the cell with smaller fluorescent probes that do not have the size limitations of the relatively large GFP. This approach allows for viewing the proteins of interest in a live cell using light microscopy, which can reveal the changing locations of the color-tagged proteins during a living process. After a chemical adjustment to the fluorescent tag so it can be visible by electron microscope as well, the same cell can be viewed at much higher resolution, revealing exquisite details invisible in the light microscope.
Using fluorescent probes, Dr. Tsien and his NCMIR colleagues demonstrated a powerful new approach for observing the complex dynamics of the Golgi apparatus—the organelle responsible for correctly sorting, targeting, and trafficking protein in human cells. Understanding how the Golgi functions is important as this organelle may be linked to Alzheimer’s disease and a host of other protein and lipid storage diseases that are likely brought about by the effects of incorrectly sorting proteins and lipids in our cells. The research team designed a molecular probe optimized for correlated light and electron microscopic analysis and fused it to a specific Golgi-resident protein. The fluorescent portion of the probe permitted the researchers to use light microscopy to trace the breakup and subsequent reassembly of the Golgi apparatus in living cells throughout mitosis. Using time-lapse live-cell imaging, the team traced the dynamics of the Golgi apparatus through the cycle of cell growth and division.
As a Co-Investigator with NCMIR, Dr. Tsien has recently received a four-year renewal of his National Institutes of Health / National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIH / NIGMS) grant: Advanced Probes and Targeting for Multiscale Microscopy. In particular, Dr. Tsien aims to improve fluorescent proteins, quantum dots, methods for delivery of nanoparticles to cytosolic and nuclear targets, and methods for correlative optical/electron microscopic imaging.
The Center for Research in Biological Systems (CRBS) and all NCMIR staff are delighted to congratulate Dr. Tsien on his remarkable achievement and honor bestowed by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. We look forward to continuing the vital work with our esteemed colleague, the Nobel Laureate, Dr. Roger Tsien.
Nobel Prize News Releases
The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences
http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/chemistry/laureates/2008/press.html
University of California San Diego News Release
http://ucsdnews.ucsd.edu/newsrel/science/NobelPrize08.asp
San Diego Union Tribune
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/science/20081008-0253-bn08nobel.html
National Institutes of Health News Release
http://www.nih.gov/news/health/oct2008/od-08a.htm
UCSD’s Tsien Laboratory
http://www.tsienlab.ucsd.edu/
The National Center for Microscopy and Imaging Research (NCMIR) http://ncmir.ucsd.edu/ at the University of California San Diego develops state-of-the-art 3D imaging and analysis technologies to help biomedical researchers understand biological structure and function relationships in cells and tissues in the dimensional range between 5 nm3 and 50mm3.
