The Riveal Contrast Imaging System for High-Resolution Cellular Microscopy

在过去的几年里，细胞微生物学在一定程度上受到成像技术进步的推动，出现了复兴。研究人员深入观察细胞并可视化大分子复合体的定位和组织的能力促进了我们对细胞生物学中基本生物学过程的理解。光学和电子显微镜的创新为完成这些基本过程的多蛋白质复合体和细菌超微结构提供了新的见解。细菌是高度组织化的细胞，拥有隔室、细胞骨架、结构化的基因组和精心定位的大分子机器。这些细胞内的错综复杂也可以应用于细菌群落的相互作用，例如那些发生在生物膜中的相互作用。在生物膜中集体多细胞群落的保护范围内，细菌可以在几乎任何环境中存活，并抵抗大多数抗菌剂的杀菌效果。微生物的持久性具有深远的医疗、商业和环境影响。所需设备包括一种新颖的Riveal对比度显微镜成像系统，它代表了生物医学成像技术的最新发展。该系统的主要优点是能够捕获未染色和/或新鲜样品中的结构信息。倾斜照明与专利软件算法相结合，产生了使用传统照明技术看不到的结构细节的全彩色散射光图像。当与荧光显微镜相结合时，该系统能够提供有关蛋白质定位和由此产生的超微结构变化的详细信息。该设备将成为我们集团在一系列生物系统中进行尖端尖端细胞生物学研究的必要工具。它还将作为开发新的相关显微技术和培训下一代细胞生物学家的平台。

Cellular microbiology has seen a renaissance in the past several years, spurred in part by advances in imaging techniques. The ability of researchers to peer into cells and visualize the localization and organization of macromolecular complexes has advanced our understanding of fundamental biological processes in cell biology. Innovations in light and electron microscopy have provided new insight into the multi-protein complexes and bacterial ultrastructures that accomplish these fundamental processes. Bacteria are highly organized cells that possess compartments, cytoskeletons, structured genomes, and carefully positioned macromolecular machines. These intracellular intricacies can be applied to bacterial community interactions as well, such as those that occur in biofilms. Within the protective confines of a collective multi-cellular community in a biofilm, bacteria can persist in almost any environment, and resist the bactericidal effects of most antimicrobials. Microbial persistence has far reaching medical, commercial and environmental implications. The equipment requested consists of a novel Riveal Contrast Microscope imaging system that represents a state-of-the-art development in biomedical imaging technology. The main advantage of this system is the ability to capture structural information within unstained and/or fresh samples. The oblique illumination coupled with proprietary software algorithms yields full colour scattered-light images of structural details not visible using traditional illumination techniques. When coupled with fluorescence microscopy, the system is capable of providing detailed information about protein localization and resulting ultrastructural changes. This equipment will become an essential tool for sophisticated leading edge cell biology research for our group in a range of biological systems. It will also serve as a platform for developing new correlative microscopy techniques and for training the next generation of cell biologists.