Fluorescence microscope for live biology

细胞或细菌等生物物体的组织对生物功能至关重要。例如，在组织中，单个细胞被组织成正确功能所必需的特定排列，或者在细菌生物膜中，膜内不同细菌物种的组织决定了整个群落的行为。微流体和“软光刻”工具提供了对哺乳动物细胞、细菌和潜在真菌在表面的空间组织的控制。我们建议使用这些工具来研究细胞组织对生物功能的影响，以应用于组织工程、环境工程和可再生燃料。了解细胞组织如何影响生物功能的一个关键工具是显微镜，它具有在适当的环境条件下随时间观察和表征细胞组织的能力。该提案要求资金为拟议项目获得这一关键分析工具。具体来说，所要求的显微镜将允许用户在多个时间点观察细胞、细菌和真菌的组织和组织变化，这些细胞、细菌和真菌在培养皿、载玻片或微流体装置中成组或作为单个细胞培养。

The organization of biological objects such as cells or bacteria is critical to biological function. For example, in a tissue individual cells are organized into a specific arrangement necessary for correct function or in a bacterial biofilm, the organization of different bacterial species within the film determines the behaviour of the whole community. Microfluidic and "soft-lithgraphy" tools provide control over the spatial organization of mammalian cells, bacteria, and potentially fungi on a surface. We propose to use these tools to examine the effect of cell organization on biological function for applications in tissue engineering, environmental engineering and renewable fuels. A critical tool for understanding how biological function is influenced by cell organization is a microscope with the capacity to observe and characterize cell organization over time under the appropriate environmental conditions. This proposal requests the funds to obtain this key analytical tool for the proposed projects. Specifically the requested microscope will allow users to observe, at multiple time points, organization and changes in organization of cells, bacteria and fungi cultured in groups or as single cells in petri-dishes, slides or microfluidic devices.