AN EXPERIMENTAL STUDY OF LASERS AS EXCITATION SOURCES FOR AUTOMATED FLUORESCENT ANTIBODY INSTRUMENTATION

Abstract

Argon ion and helium-cadmium lasers were experimentally evaluated as potential excitation sources in flying spot-scanned fluorescent antibody instrumentation. It was concluded that these lasers are capable of exciting at least 100 times more fluorescence from fluorescein isothiocyanate tagged conjugates than the best conventional arc lamp when using full field illumination. In high resolution flying spot scanners this advantage can be as great as a factor of 10g. Two new phenomena were observed, namely, almost complete recovery of initial fluorescence intensity when the sample was allowed to recover in the dark for periods up to 48 hr. and changes in color of fluorescein isothiocyanate-tagged conjugate fluorescence tinder laser excitation.