Lipids and the membranes they form are fundamental building blocks of cellular life, and their geometry and chemical properties distinguish membranes from other cellular environments. Collective processes occurring within membranes strongly impact cellular behavior and biochemistry, and understanding these processes presents unique challenges due to the often complex and myriad interactions between membrane components. Super-resolution microscopy offers a significant gain in resolution over traditional optical microscopy, enabling the localization of individual molecules even in densely labeled samples and in cellular and tissue environments. These microscopy techniques have been used to examine the organization and dynamics of plasma membrane components, providing insight into the fundamental interactions that determine membrane functions. Here, we broadly introduce the structure and organization of the mammalian plasma membrane and review recent applications of super-resolution microscopy to the study of membranes. We then highlight some inherent challenges faced when using super-resolution microscopy to study membranes, and we discuss recent technical advancements that promise further improvements to super-resolution microscopy and its application to the plasma membrane.

中文翻译：

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超分辨率显微镜：在细胞质膜上发光

脂质和它们形成的膜是细胞生命的基本组成部分，它们的几何形状和化学性质将膜与其他细胞环境区分开来。膜内发生的集体过程强烈影响细胞行为和生物化学，由于膜成分之间通常复杂而无数的相互作用，因此了解这些过程提出了独特的挑战。与传统的光学显微镜相比，超分辨率显微镜可显着提高分辨率，即使在标记密集的样品中以及在细胞和组织环境中，也可以对单个分子进行定位。这些显微镜技术已用于检查质膜组件的组织和动力学，从而洞悉确定膜功能的基本相互作用。这里，我们广泛介绍了哺乳动物质膜的结构和组织，并回顾了超分辨率显微镜在膜研究中的最新应用。然后，我们重点介绍了使用超分辨率显微镜研究膜时所面临的一些固有挑战，并且我们讨论了最新的技术进步，这些技术有望对超分辨率显微镜及其在质膜上的应用进行进一步的改进。