Synchrotron based infrared imaging and spectroscopy via focal plane array on live fibroblasts in D2O enriched medium

•We use synchrotron infrared imaging to study biochemical and biophysical processes in living cells.•We can observe distribution and conformational properties of lipids.•We can measure the kinetics of hydrogen/deuterium exchange in cellular locations.•We can image gradients of isotopic concentration associated to metabolism.

We successfully tested the viability of using synchrotron-based full-field infrared imaging to study biochemical processes inside living cells. As a model system, we studied fibroblast cells exposed to a medium highly enriched with D2O. We could show that the experimental technique allows us to reproduce at the cellular level measurements that are normally performed on purified biological molecules. We can obtain information about lipid conformation and distribution, kinetics of hydrogen/deuterium exchange, and the formation of concentration gradients of H and O isotopes in water that are associated with cell metabolism. The implementation of the full field technique in a sequential imaging format gives a description of cellular biochemistry and biophysics that contains both spatial and temporal information.

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