Multiphoton intravital microscopy setup to visualize the mouse mammary gland

Recently, light microscopy-based techniques have been extended to live mammalian models leading to the development of a new imaging approach called intravital microscopy (IVM). Although IVM has been introduced at the beginning of the last century, its major advancements have occurred in the last twenty years with the development of non-linear microscopy that has enabled performing deep tissue imaging. IVM has been utilized to address many biological questions in basic research and is now a fundamental tool that provide information on tissues such as morphology, cellular architecture, and metabolic status. IVM has become an indispensable tool in numerous areas. This study presents and describes the practical aspects of IVM necessary to visualize epithelial cells of live mouse mammary gland with multiphoton techniques.