Visualizing Nerve Endings

One feature of patient individuality is that the person on the surgical table may not have his or her physiology conforming to text book illustrations.  Nerve injury is thus a surgical risk-which is why researchers at the UC-San Diego sought to attach fluorescent peptides to altered bacteriophages that have specificity for nerve cells.  In animal studies, these probes attached to nerves, which a light source then illuminate, and remained glowing for about two hours.        MORE

Image Credit: Michael A. Whitney et al