title: Optical Tools to Investigate Cellular Activity in the Intestinal Wall.
abstract: Live imaging has become an essential tool to investigate the coordinated activity and output of cellular networks. Within the last decade, 2 Nobel prizes have been awarded to recognize innovations in the field of imaging: one for the discovery, use, and optimization of the green fluorescent protein (2008) and the second for the development of super-resolved fluorescence microscopy (2014). New advances in both optogenetics and microscopy now enable researchers to record and manipulate ac-tivity from specific populations of cells with better contrast and resolution, at higher speeds, and deeper into live tissues. In this review, we will discuss some of the recent developments in microscope technology and in the synthesis of fluorescent probes, both synthetic and genetically encoded. We focus on how live imaging of cellular physiology has progressed our under-standing of the control of gastrointestinal motility, and we discuss the hurdles to overcome in order to apply the novel tools in the field of neurogastroenterology and motility.
authors.affiliation: Laboratory for Enteric NeuroScience (LENS), Translational Research Center for GastroIntestinal Disorders (TARGID), Department of Clinical and Experimental Medicine, University of Leuven, Leuven, Belgium.
authors.forename: Werend
authors.identifier: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-2426-0451
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Boesmans
authors.affiliation: Laboratory for Enteric NeuroScience (LENS), Translational Research Center for GastroIntestinal Disorders (TARGID), Department of Clinical and Experimental Medicine, University of Leuven, Leuven, Belgium.
authors.forename: Marlene M
authors.identifier: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-9701-8252
authors.initials: MM
authors.lastname: Hao
authors.affiliation: Laboratory for Enteric NeuroScience (LENS), Translational Research Center for GastroIntestinal Disorders (TARGID), Department of Clinical and Experimental Medicine, University of Leuven, Leuven, Belgium.
authors.forename: Pieter
authors.identifier: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-0009-2094
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Vanden Berghe
keywords: Calcium imaging; Enteric nervous system; Fluorescence; Gastrointestinal motility; Microscopy