초록

We carried out an image analysis of living cells forming their contacts at the bottom of the cell culturing substrate. In order to visualize the contact area selectively, we adopted total-internal-reflection-fluorescence (TIRF) method, which can illuminate the specimen volume within only several hundred nano-meters above the substrate. From the fluorescent intensity of the TIRF image, we could calculate the distance of the cell surface from the substrate. As a result, we visualized the origin of cell contacts, their movements, and the change of cell-contact type from the close-contact into focal-contact with information of its vertical displacement representing the temporal evolution process of the three-dimensional cell-surface-profile near the contact area during this metamorphosis.