Instrumentation for spectrophotometric characterization of
single oocyte
Typical diameter of porcine oocytes is in 100–150 m range.
Due to the size and volume incompatibility, the spectrophotometric
characterization of a single oocyte is impossible to carry out
in a typical cuvette with 10 mm-long optical path and at least a
few hundreds microliters in volume. On the other hand, miniaturized
spectrometers and light sources co-working with optical
fibers, playing as light guiders to and from characterized object,
are available now. What’s more, the LOC technique enables fabrication
of microchannels with diameter similar to the size of oocytes
and optical fibers. The developed by us LOC-based instrumentation
co-worked with a miniaturized spectrometer (USB4000 VIS-NIR,
Ocean Optics) and VIS/NIR halogen lamp (HL-2000, Ocean Optics)
coupled with specialized (VIS/NIR, Ocean Optics) optical fibers
(Fig. 1). Ends of these fibers were parts of LOC forming an optical
path for a single oocyte spectrophotometric characterization.