FocalPlane - Where biology meets microscopy

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This image comes from Anh Le, a PhD student in Laura Machesky’s lab. It is a temporal-colour image of a COS-7 cell expressing a mCherry-tagged RAB5A construct – an early endosome marker. The cells are plated on a fibronectin-coated dish and then imaged every 9 seconds for a total of 7 minutes using a super-resolution microscope system. A temporal colour code was applied to visualise the dynamic of these vesicles. Each shade of yellow represents a particular point in time for each of the vesicles. The overall back-and-forth movement of the vesicles gives an overall effect of an explosion of colours. The image won the Scottish Microscopy Society Summer 2020 imaging competition.

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Post-doc position in Chelsea using Fluorescence Correlation Spectroscopy

Posted by Jonathon Pines, on 8 August 2020

We have a post-doctoral position open for a microscopist/biophysicist to analyse cell division using Fluorescence Correlation Spectroscopy. We use CRISPR/Cas9 edited cell lines to measure the in vivo kinetics of the mitotic machinery. Please apply to join our friendly and enthusiastic team at the ICR:https://icr.tal.net/vx/appcentre-ext/brand-0/candidate/so/pm/1/pl/1/opp/1076-Postdoctoral-Training-Fellow-Cell-Division/en-GB

Science and Art – the not so odd couple?

Posted by Sophie Morgani, on 31 July 2020

At a first, superficial glance, you could be forgiven for placing scientists and artists at the opposite ends of the career spectrum. Scientists need to be accurate and methodical. They must generate highly reproducible data while adhering to strict regulations. On the other hand, artists are often stereotyped as disorganized, free spirits, ungoverned by rules,

Expansion microscopy

Posted by Shoh Asano, on 29 July 2020

Written by Shoh Asano and Ruixuan Gao Light microscopy and diffraction limit For centuries, light microscopy has played a central role in biological studies. The first implementations of a light microscope dates back to as early as the late 16th and early 17th century, when an array of polished lenses was used to magnify (biological)

“openFrame” for modular, extensible, easily maintained, open-source microscopy

Posted by Sunil Kumar, on 23 July 2020

The openFrame [1] is an open-source microscopy hardware project initiated by the Photonics Group in the Physics Department at Imperial College London that is intended to provide access to a modular, upgradable, easily maintained and modifiable microscope frame that can be implemented at relatively low cost compared to existing commercial instruments. openFrame is a component

Electron microscopy: from the dark ages to a bright future

Posted by Lucy Collinson, on 21 July 2020

Good sample preparation is, as every microscopist knows, the key to delivering sound results from an imaging experiment. In the digital age, and with the advent of big data, image analysis is also critical to extract meaningful quantitative results from image data. Indeed nowadays, the microscope itself is often the most well-developed and user-friendly part

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