[Philip Lelyveld comment: this is high resolution 3D video microscopy.]
[The Engineer]
A microscope system that captures 3D video of cells at very high resolution is helping scientists understand how AIDS and other diseases spread.
The Deltavision OMX Blaze system can reveal the internal structures of living cells that are too small to be seen with visible light and has enabled researchers at the University of California, Davis, to examine how the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) moves between cells. …
A previous generation of the OMX technology enabled the capture of super-resolution 3D image data but the Blaze model is able to acquire such images fast enough to capture dynamics in living cells, effectively at a rate of one every 10 seconds.
Other imaging systems that allow the examination of structures smaller than the wavelength of light, such as electron microscopes, typically require samples to be chemically ’fixed’ and viewed in a vacuum so are unsuitable for monitoring living cells over time.
API’s system, based on research from the University of California, San Francisco, uses fluorescence imaging whereby cells are illuminated with a specific pattern of light. The information captured in the images is used to calculate the higher resolution structures.
By rotating and shifting the light pattern across 15 different positions, the system can capture multiple images at a rate of 105 per second that are processed to create moving 3D pictures with data about the exact positions of cell structures. …
Read the full story here: http://www.theengineer.co.uk/sectors/medical-and-healthcare/news/3d-video-microscope-helps-scientists-study-hiv/1010779.article