TPE-MI (Tetraphenylethene maleimide) is an aggregation-induced luminescent agent that stains living cells, can be used to capture cysteines in exposed unfolded proteins, and detects protein damage after dihydroartemisinin studies of malaria parasites.

TPE-MI cell staining
1. Solution preparation: TPE-MI is dissolved in DMSO as a 1 or 2 mM stock solution. The stock solution is stored at 4°C in the dark.
2. Operation steps
1. Cultivate cells to a suitable state, rinse with PBS to remove residual culture medium, and treat with freshly diluted TPE-MI (50 μM PBS solution) at 37°C for 30 minutes;
2. Rinse with PBS to remove residual TPE-MI solution;
3. Application examples
1) Flow cytometry analysis: Resuspend cells in PBS, precipitate by centrifugation (120 g reaction, 6 minutes), and then resuspend in 250 μL PBS in a flow cytometry tube for detection and analysis.
2) Fluorescence imaging: Fix cells on the plate with 4% paraformaldehyde.
3) SDS-PAGE: The stained cells were lysed on the plate by adding native lysis buffer and analyzed by 12% acrylamide SDS-PAGE.