Full pallete of lipophilic tracers

Lipophilic carbocyanine dyes are cyanine fluorescent dyes bearing hydrophobic hydrocarbon tails. These dyes exhibit low fluorescence in an aqueous environment but show high fluorescence when incorporated into lipid bilayers, which makes them valuable for staining membranes. These dyes have been employed as tracers in investigations involving cell fusion, cellular adhesion, and migration due to their minimal toxicity and strong resistance to transfer between cells. Additionally, these dyes are widely used as anterograde and retrograde axonal tracers in living and fixed neuronal tissues and cells.

Lumiprobe offers a range of carbocyanine dyes with different membrane diffusion rates, solubility, and fluorescence properties:

DiI (DiIC18(3))

A bright and photostable orange-red fluorescent lipophilic dye widely used for membrane labeling, cell tracking, axonal tracing, and super-resolution imaging by STORM.

DiO (DiOC18(3))

A widely used green fluorescent lipophilic dye with a slower lateral diffusion rate on the membranes than DiI. DiO is often used together with DiI in dual-color studies.

DiA (4-Di-16-ASP)

A yellow-green fluorescent lipophilic dye that diffuses much faster than DiO in cell membranes. DiA is often used together with DiI for dual-color labeling.

DiD (DiIC18(5))

An analog of DiI with red-shifted fluorescence excitation and emission spectra allowing to avoid autofluorescence and phototoxic effects during imaging. The dye is used for multicolor labeling and super-resolution imaging by STORM.

DiR (DiIC18(7))

A near-infrared (NIR) fluorescent lipophilic dye. The NIR region of the spectrum is optically transparent for many tissues so that DiR can be used for small animal in vivo imaging and super-resolution microscopy by STORM.

Neuro-DiO

A green fluorescent lipophilic carbocyanine dye. In contrast to DiO, Neuro-DiO has been specifically designed to improve solubility in membranes and prevent the formation of nonfluorescent aggregates, which tend to decrease the dye diffusion rate.

RAPID DiI (dilinoleyl DiI; FAST DiI™)

An unsaturated analog of DiI with a faster lateral diffusion rate in cell membranes than the original DiI. It is especially useful for tracing neurons both in live and fixed tissues.

RAPID DiO (dilinoleyl DiO; FAST DiO™)

An unsaturated analog of DiO with a faster lateral diffusion rate in cell membranes than the original DiO. It is especially useful for tracing neurons both in live and fixed tissues.

CM-DiI

An orange-red fluorescent carbocyanine dye containing thiol-reactive chloromethyl (CM) moiety. Unlike other membrane dyes, CM-DiI has increased water solubility and can be fixed using traditional aldehyde fixatives. CM-DiI also persists in cells after permeabilization procedures.

Lipophilic Tracer Sampler Kit

Lipophilic Tracer Sampler Kit contains samplers of eight carbocyanine dyes: DiI, DiO, DiA, DiD, DiR, Neuro-DiO, RAPID DiI, RAPID DiO.

Key properties of lipophilic carbocyanine tracers are summarized here:

Tracer	Excitation, nm	Emission, nm	Fast migration	Fixable
DiO	487	501	No	No
Neuro-DiO	497	514	No	No
RAPID DiO	487	501	Yes	No
DiA	492	607	No	No
DiI	551	566	No	No
RAPID DiI	551	565	Yes	No
CM-DiI	556	571	No	Yes
DiD	647	666	No	No
DiR	750	775	No	No