Development of the fluorescent probe CenSpark for labeling centrioles and cilia.

CenSpark, a dual-ligand fluorescent small-molecule probe, selectively labels centriolar and axonemal microtubules in live and fixed specimens, enabling visualization of centrioles, cilia, and flagella.

• Why it matters: Generic small-molecule tools for selective visualization of centriolar and axonemal microtubules are lacking, limiting subcellular studies in systems without molecular genetic tools.
• What they did: CenSpark was engineered as a cell-permeable dual-ligand probe using juxtaposed inner and outer microtubule-binding sites of triplets and doublets found exclusively in centriolar and axonemal microtubules.
• The result: Using CenSpark, the authors measured the rate of primary cilium formation and tracked centrioles in chimeric antigen receptor T cells during polarization at the immunological synapse with unprecedented resolution.

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