Flow Cytometry Gating

Gating is an important part of any flow cytometry experiment. The gates alongside regions can be placed around cells expressing similar characteristics, often forward and side scatter or fluorescent marker expression, in order to examine and quantify these target populations.
 
 
It is best to obtain as much information about the cells you will be observing and the controls and markers used prior to the start of your experiment. One way to do so is to estimate the size and granularity of the cells and how these parameters can change over the course of the experiment due to apoptosis, intracellular staining or fixation. 
 
 
By adding a negative control, you can easily set up a negative gate and observe only the real populations, which further simplifies the experiment.