“For people who understand the basic physics behind it, it makes sense. But if you’re not familiar with it, it looks like a magic trick,” said Dr. ZhihaoOu.
A common food dye found in the popular snack Doritos can make mouse skin transparent, according to a new study by Stanford University scientists. In a paper published on September 5 in the journal Science titled How they can see through the skin of living mice.
The dye found in Doritos makes the mouse’s skin transparent.
Led by Dr. Zhihao Ou, assistant professor of physics at the University of Texas at Dallas, the experiment was conducted in a quest to find better ways to visualize tissues and organs inside the body. The researchers applied a mixture of water and tartrazine, a common food dye known as FD&C Yellow 5, to make the skin on the skulls and abdomens of live mice transparent.
For those who understand the basic physics behind it, it makes sense. But if you’re not familiar with it, it looks like a magic trick,” Ove said in an explanation of the research on the university’s website. “It takes a few minutes for transparency to appear. This is similar to the way a face cream or mask works: the time required depends on how quickly the molecules diffuse into the skin.
We combined the pigment yellow, which is a molecule that absorbs most light, especially blue and ultraviolet light, with skin, which is a scattering medium. Individually, these two things block most light from getting through them. But when we put them together, we were able to get the transparency of the mouse skin,” explained Oo. As the scalp skin became transparent, the researchers directly observed the blood vessels on the surface of the mouse brain. Able to do.
Meanwhile, in the stomach, they were able to observe contractions of internal organs and muscles in the digestive system. The release notes that scientists have not yet tested this process on humans. Because human skin is 10 times thicker than that of mice, it is unclear what dose of dye or delivery method would be necessary to penetrate the full thickness, Ou explained.
Explaining the application of the research findings to the medical field, Ou said, Our research group is mostly academics, so when we looked at the results of our experiments, the first thing we thought about was The thought was how this could improve biomedical research. Optical instruments, such as microscopes, are not used to directly study living humans or animals because light cannot pass through living tissue. But now that we can make the tissue transparent, it will allow us to see more detailed dynamics. This will completely revolutionize current optical research in biology.
A dye found in Doritos makes mouse skin transparent like a ‘magic trick,’ new study finds
Researchers at Stanford University have made an intriguing discovery: a common food dye found in Doritos, FD&C Yellow 5, can render mouse skin transparent, offering groundbreaking possibilities for biomedical research. Published on September 5 in Science, this study, led by Dr. Zhihao Ou, demonstrates how this dye can enhance our ability to visualize internal tissues.
In their experiment, Dr. Ou and his team applied a solution of water mixed with tartrazine to the skin of live mice. This mixture works by reducing light scattering, thereby making the skin transparent. This breakthrough allowed the researchers to observe blood vessels on the mouse brain and monitor contractions in internal organs and muscles in the digestive system without invasive procedures.
Dr. Ou explained that while the process might appear magical to those unfamiliar with the physics involved, it is a sophisticated application of light absorption and scattering principles. The technique, although not yet tested on humans due to differences in skin thickness, has significant potential to revolutionize optical imaging in biomedical research, offering clearer insights into tissue dynamics and organ functions.
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