A scale CUBIC-based clearing protocol preserves fluorescence in mouse rib bone and cartilage
Mackenzie Fernandez, Emerson Soo-Hoo, Kaelynn Perez Castro, Kimtee Kundu, Divya D Patel, Francesca V Mariani · 2026
Read A scale CUBIC-based clearing protocol preserves fluorescence in mouse rib bone and cartilage by Mackenzie Fernandez, Emerson Soo-Hoo, Kaelynn Perez Castro, Kimtee Kundu, Divya D Patel, Francesca V Mariani (2026) in the Tower of Babel, a free online library of public-domain works preserved in clean, searchable text. No sign-up. The full text is served as a plain-text file at a predictable URL, where text is present: https://antarctic-labs.com/tower-of-babel/PMC13574278.txt.
Description
Mackenzie Fernandez, with five colleagues, presents a 2026 lab protocol that clears mouse rib bone for imaging while keeping fluorescent tags bright. Clearing turns tissue transparent so whole organs can be viewed without slicing. Bone and cartilage resist most recipes, and harsh ones dim the glow that genetic tags provide.
The method adapts a water-based clearing family, Scale CUBIC, for adult rib bone and needs no decalcification step. Transparency arrives in about 48 hours. In transgenic mice bred to glow in set cells, both the glow and the tissue's natural shape survived the bath. Growth plate and repair zones in the rib stayed readable. The authors offer the recipe as a dependable route for hard tissue imaging in mouse models.
Catalog record
| CREATOR | Mackenzie Fernandez, Emerson Soo-Hoo, Kaelynn Perez Castro, Kimtee Kundu, Divya D Patel, Francesca V Mariani |
|---|---|
| YEAR | 2026 |
| COLLECTION | PAPERS |
| FORMAT | TXT |
| FILE SIZE | 42 KB |
| LICENSE | https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0 |
| RIGHTS | CC BY |
| SOURCE | Europe PMC |