Benchmarking of novel green fluorescent proteins for the quantification of protein oligomerization in living cells

Protein-protein-interactions play an important role in several cellular functions. Quantitative non-invasive techniques are applied in living cells to evaluate such interactions, thereby providing a broader understanding of complex biological processes. Fluorescence fluctuation spectroscopy describes a group of quantitative microscopy approaches for the characterization of molecular interactions at single cell resolution. Through the obtained molecular brightness, it is possible to determine the oligomeric state of proteins. This is usually achieved by fusing fluorescent proteins (FPs) to the protein of interest. Recently, the number of novel green FPs has increased, with consequent improvements to the quality of fluctuation-based measurements. The photophysical behavior of FPs is influenced by multiple factors (including photobleaching, protonation-induced "blinking" and long-lived dark states). Assessing these factors is critical for selecting the appropriate fluorescent tag for live cell imaging applications. In this work, we focus on novel green FPs that are extensively used in live cell imaging. A systematic performance comparison of several green FPs in living cells under different pH conditions using Number & Brightness (N&B) analysis and scanning fluorescence correlation spectroscopy was performed. Our results show that the new FP Gamillus exhibits higher brightness at the cost of lower photostability and fluorescence probability (pf), especially at lower pH. mGreenLantern, on the other hand, thanks to a very high pf, is best suited for multimerization quantification at neutral pH. At lower pH, mEGFP remains apparently the best choice for multimerization investigation. These guidelines provide the information needed to plan quantitative fluorescence microscopy involving these FPs, both for general imaging or for Protein-protein-interactions quantification via fluorescence fluctuation-based methods.