ReviewLaser microdissection: A promising tool for exploring microorganisms and their interactions with hosts

- A brief review of commercially available laser microdissection systems is provided.
- Laser microdissection provides new insights in host-microorganism interactions.
- Laser microdissection is a new tool for exploring uncultivated bacteria and biofilms.
- Laser microdissection is an alternative instrument for single cell analysis.

Laser microdissection is a method that allows for the isolation of homogenous cell populations from their native niches in tissues for downstream molecular assays. This method is widely used for genomic analysis, gene expression profiling and proteomic and metabolite assays in various fields of biology, but it remains an uncommon approach in microbiological research. In spite of the limited number of publications, laser microdissection was shown to be an extremely useful method for studying host-microorganism interactions in animals and plants, investigating bacteria within biofilms, identifying uncultivated bacteria and performing single prokaryotic cell analysis. The current paper describes the methodological aspects of commercially available laser microdissection instruments and representative examples that demonstrate the advantages of this method for resolving a variety of issues in microbiology.