Flow cytometry is used most often to analyze white blood cells.
Some appropriate samples are:
- Peripheral blood
- Bone marrow
- Lymph nodes and other tissues
- Fluids (cerebrospinal fluid, peritoneal, pleural, etc.)
Since size and granularity are utilized to help sort cell populations, it is imperative to keep the cells intact. Thus, flow cytometry is best conducted on viable cells. Dead cells can complicate result interpretation by:
- Non-specifically binding monoclonal antibodies and emitting false fluorescent signals.
- Falling in inappropriate portions of the light scatter graph and falsely elevating event/cell counts.