CLARITY

[1] When accompanied with antibody or gene-based labeling, CLARITY enables highly detailed pictures of the protein and nucleic acid structure of organs, especially the brain.

Next a series of chemical treatments must be applied to achieve transparency, in which the lipid content of the sample is removed, while almost all of the original proteins and nucleic acids are left in place.

[1] The purpose of this is to make the tissue transparent and thus amenable to detailed microscopic investigation of its constituent functional parts (which are predominantly proteins and nucleic acids).

The contrast for imaging can come from endogenous fluorescent molecules, from nucleic acid (DNA or RNA) labels, or from immunostaining, whereby antibodies that bind specifically to a certain target substance are used.

[16] Numerous modifications have been published to build upon the initial publications and efforts have been made both academically and within the biotech industry to apply broad-scope applications to CLARITY.

CLARITY continues to gain traction as an emergent technology that can provide powerful insights into clinical diagnostics in the future.

CLARITY can be used with little or no modifications to clear most other organs such as liver, pancreas, spleen, testis, and ovaries and other species such as zebrafish.

Time has often been cited as a limiting factor and disadvantage to using the CLARITY technique; however, several academic and biotech companies (Logos Bioscience, ClearLight Biotechnologies) have continued to develop and optimize CLARITY reagents that significantly truncated the immunostaining time frame reducing the process from six weeks to as quickly as a week depending on sample type.