Interesting insights into the frontiers of optical imaging – get a taste of wheat the future brings!

The optical microscope has revolutionized biology since at least the 17th Century. Since then, it has progressed from a largely observational tool to a powerful bioanalytical platform. However, realizing its full potential to study live specimens is hindered by a daunting array of technical challenges. Here, we delve into the current state of live imaging to explore the barriers that must be overcome and the possibilities that lie ahead. We venture to envision a future where we can visualize and study everything, everywhere, all at once – from the intricate inner workings of a single cell to the dynamic interplay across entire organisms, and a world where scientists could access the necessary microscopy technologies anywhere.

Link: https://www.nature.com/articles/s42003-023-05468-9

A very good paper on image analysis and guidelines to avoid misshandling

Link: https://www.embopress.org/doi/full/10.15252/embj.2020105889

Several Bioimaging facilities in Denmark are sharing thoughts on protocols and rules to ensure social distancing and hygienic conditions to prevent the spreading of COVID-19. Share your thoughts here

Link:

Fun and insightful examples of the problems computer vision and classification of image content is facing. Also have a look at their online demos here: http://www.robots.ox.ac.uk/~vgg/demo/

Link: http://www.robots.ox.ac.uk/~vgg/blog/index.html

This years Christmas gift: Check out this cool new community based website, initiated by Zeiss, that will help you save time when doing image analysis. Make your own workflows using other’s predefined modules or make you own and publish it for others to use. And it is all free!

Link: https://www.apeer.com/app/#/home

Frontiers in Neuroinformatics: The Blue Brain Cell Atlas allows anyone to visualize every region in the mouse brain, cell-by-cell – and freely download data for new analyses and modelling.

Like “going from raw satellite images to Google Earth”, the Blue Brain Cell Atlas allows anyone to visualize every region in the mouse brain, cell-by-cell – and freely download data for new analyses and modelling.

The first digital 3D atlas of every cell in the mouse brain provides neuroscientists with previously unavailable information on major cell types, numbers and positions in all of the 737 brain regions – which could massively accelerate progress in brain science.

Link: https://blog.frontiersin.org/2018/11/28/neuroscience-blue-brain-mouse-cell-atlas/?utm_source=EM&utm_medium=F-NLT&utm_campaign=ECO_FNINF_20181100_blue-brain-cell-atlas

In this Scientific Reports paper authors used quantitative and correlative analyses to assess the performance of Structured Illumination Microscopy (SIM), STimulated Emission Depletion (STED) microscopy and Single Molecule Localisation Microscopy (SMLM) the aim of establishing a rough guideline regarding the suitability for typical applications and to highlight pitfalls associated with the different techniques.

Link: https://www.nature.com/articles/srep27290

Engineers at FAU have developed a method for increasing the resolution of digital cameras by four times without having to use larger and more expensive image sensors. This is achieved by irregularly scanning the pixels and reconstructing the image afterwards. The next step involves developing a prototype that will enable more research to be carried out.

Link: https://www.fau.eu/2018/04/26/news/research/engineers-at-fau-develop-new-scanning-method-for-digital-image-sensors/

The 3D viewer in FiJi (ImageJ) will soon be optional as there is a new viewer, FPBioimage, coming that looks very promising.

Link: https://twitter.com/fantm_science

With a small efforts this paper describes how you can turn your cell phone into a decent microscope. They show a resolution down to 4.38 µm – try it out!

Link: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-018-21543-2