ABSTRACT
Finally, t he e volution o f t he opt ical m icroscope i ntroduced t he opp ortunity to b rowse t hrough additional dimensions in the cell universe. Fluorescence manipulation by uorescence recovery a er
photoleaching a nd photoactivation protocols, uorescence resonance energy t ransfer, sp ectral i maging, and uorescence lifetime introduced an innovative perspective in the approach to the structure/ function problem. Besides providing a c haracterization of t he cellular a nd i ntracellular s tructures at good resolution, uorescence microscopy acquired the ability to p erform functional analysis d irectly looking at molecular mobility, biomolecular interactions in living cells and organisms, and evaluating metabolic parameters through the analysis of photophysical properties of the living environment.
