Influence of cell growth conditions and medium composition on EGFP photostability in live cells

Abstract

Photostability is a key characteristic of fluorescent proteins. It was recently demonstrated that green fluorescent protein (GFP) photobleaching in live cells can be suppressed by changes in medium composition. Here we show that Ham's F12 medium provides very high enhanced GFP (EGFP) photostability during fluorescence microscopy of live cells. This property of Ham's F12 medium is associated with decreased concentrations of riboflavin and pyridoxine, and increased concentrations of FeSO4, cyanocobalamine, lipoic acid, hypoxanthine, and thymidine compared with DMEM. We also found that the rate of EGFP photobleaching strongly depends on cell growth conditions such as cell density and the concentration of serum. We conclude that both imaging medium composition and the physiological state of the cells can strongly affect the photostability of fluorescent proteins. Thus, accurate comparison of the photostabilities of fluorescent proteins should be performed only in side-by-side analysis in identical cell growth conditions and media.