ABSTRACT
Fluorescence photobleaching and recovery, (FPR) was developed as a method for quantitating lateral diffusion in cell membranes and synthetic bilayers. Analysis or FPR recovery curves from the type of instrument just described is complicated by the Gaussian intensity profile of the laser beam which bleaches a corresponding Gaussian profile in the fluorescence in the spot of interest. The effects of removing oligosaccharides then appear to reflect the volume occupied by these structures and their interactions with other oligosaccharides on the cell surface. The method of FPR has its roots in early work on the dynamics of cell membranes. The stripe patterns produced by either mask or fringe method also contain information about the spatial distribution of fluorophores, but this is neglected for the sake of a simple analysis of fluorescence recovery.
