D-Luciferin free acid
D-Luciferin is a common bioluminescent reporter used for in vivo imaging of the expression of luciferase. The water soluble substrate for the firefly luciferase enzyme uses ATP and Mg-Ion as cofactors to emit a characteristic yellow-green emission in the presence of oxygen, which shifts to red light in vivo at 37°C. Through the utilization of ATP, the reaction can be further used to indicate the presence of energy or life in order to function as a life-death indicator.
Luciferin is a common reagent used throughout the biotechnology family and specifically for in vivo imaging. Luciferase labeled tumor cells, stem cells or infectious diseases are often inoculated into research animals such as rats or mice for investigation. This is often made by the use of the D-Luciferin sodium salt (BC218), because of it`s good solubility in water and tolerance of living organism. The injection of luciferin allows for the real-time, noninvasive monitoring of disease progression and/or drug efficacy in these model systems through Bioluminescence Imaging (BLI).
Luciferin is also commonly used for in vitro research, including luciferase and ATP assays, gene reporter assays, high throughput sequencing and various contamination assays.
Firefly Luciferin is identical to Beetle Luciferin.
References:
http://www.wmis.org/abstracts/2012/data/papers/P293.html
