Immunoimaging: Studying Immune System Dynamics Using Two-Photon Microscopy

Cells of the immune system explore a wider territory than any other cells in the body. Responses to a pathogen typically require long-range migration of cells, short-range communication by local chemical signaling, and direct cell-cell contact. Two-photon microscopy allows these processes to be visualized within native tissue environments. Immunoimaging is rapidly developing from a merely descriptive technique into a set of methods and analytical tools that can be used to quantify and to characterize an immune response at the cellular level. This article outlines the hardware required for immunoimaging and discusses methods for quantitative analysis of multidimensional image stacks.