Advanced microscopy methods for visualizing chromatin structure

In the recent years it has become clear that our genome is not randomly organized and its architecture is tightly linked to its function. While genomic studies have given much insight into genome organization, they mostly rely on averaging over large populations of cells, are not compatible with living cells and have limited resolution. For studying genome organization in single living cells, microscopy is indispensable. In addition, the visualization of biological structures helps to understand their function. Up to now, fluorescence microscopy has allowed us to probe the larger scale organization of chromosome territories in the micron length scales, however, the smaller length scales remained invisible due to the diffraction limited spatial resolution of fluorescence microscopy. Thanks to the advent of super-resolution microscopy methods, we are finally starting to be able to probe the nanoscale organization of chromatin in vivo and these methods have the potential to greatly advance our knowledge about chromatin structure and function relationship. (C) 2015 Federation of European Biochemical Societies. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.