Lipid droplets (LDs) are mainly composed of phospholipid monolayers and hydrophobic cores of neutral lipids (triglycerides and cholesterol, etc.), and are widely found in animals, plants, and bacteria. Studies have shown that lipid droplets play an important role in regulating lipid metabolism, autophagy, cell differentiation and cell senescence.
Green Fluorometric Lipid Droplet Assay Kit (BODIPY 493/503) is a kit for the detection of intracellular lipid droplets using the green fluorescent probe BODIPY 493/503. BODIPY 493/503 is a fluorescent probe that can label neutral lipids. BODIPY 493/503 is cell-penetrating, which can be used for staining live and fixed cells. BODIPY 493/503 is virtually non-fluorescent in water or other polar solvents, and emits a strong green fluorescence once combined with neutral lipids such as triglycerides. The maximum excitation and emission wavelength of BODIPY 493/503 are 493 nm and 503 nm.
Oil Red O and Nile Red are also commonly used for lipid droplet detection. However, Oil Red O staining has problems such as complex operation, time-consuming, low accuracy, and only suitable for fixed cells; while Nile Red does not have the above problems, it is not suitable for multicolor fluorescence staining due to its wide range of emission spectrum. The BODIPY 493/503 probe used in this kit does not have these problems, and has the advantages of simple operation, strong specificity, and high sensitivity.
Figure 1: The efficiency of this kit for detecting lipid droplets