Dynamics of Fundamental Cellular Processes by Live Cell and Tissue Imaging

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The use of imaging in the biological and biomedical sciences has undergone a revolution in the last decade. One of the most important advances is the availability of quantitative imaging systems that can be used to measure the structure and dynamics of cells and tissues in the living state. In the last 5 years a number of new techniques have appeared that enable "super-resolution", where limits on the size of objects that can be seen, previously thought to form impassable barriers to scientific discovery, have been broken, enabling new opportunities for exploration and discovery. At Dundee we run one of the UK's largest light microscopy facilities delivering 18 different systems and a number of different technologies to our own and many visiting biological scientists. This application requests support for 2 new imaging systems. The first is an upgrade of an existing platform-- the OMX microscope-- that achieves super-resolution using a technique called 'structured illumination microscopy'. We have run our OMX as a national resource and the system has been extremely popular - 50% usage is dedicated to external users, and we have hosted scientists from 19 different institutions from all over the UK and Europe. We want to extend OMX's super-resolution capabilities to look at live samples to further understand fundamental questions in cellular dynamics. We are also requesting funds for a second microscope, a light sheet florescence microscope ("LSFM") that is a new technology. LSFM is particularly attractive for long-term time laps and for examining the properties of cells in tissues. The LSFM we want to build also enables super resolution live cell imaging, using a special illumination technique called a Bessel beam, developed by physicists now based at Dundee who are participating in this project. With our established expertise in running advanced imaging systems and making them available to the wider community, we are sure these new systems will enable science across a broad range of applications, from the most basic studies of single-celled to the development of embryos and how cancer works as a disease.