Immunostaining of Ectocarpus cells.

This article describes an immunostaining protocol for Ectocarpus that was optimized for the detection of tubulin but could be used with any suitable antibody. Ectocarpus has small but relatively transparent cells and the uniseriate filaments can be grown directly attached to the surface of microscope slides. These features make Ectocarpus particularly suitable for high resolution imaging approaches, both in vivo or after fixation. All incubations described below are carried out on a platform shaker at room temperature. Use high-quality microscope slides to avoid imperfections in the glass that can be a problem for confocal laserscan microscopy analysis.