In the Details

When it comes to seeing the bigger picture, wide-field fluorescence microscopy is a technique often used by researchers. It allows them to image entire tissues in action. However, it isn’t so great at capturing the finer details. Researchers now present a solution for capturing high-resolution 3D images of live whole tissues – volumetric wide-field fluorescence microscopy combined with two established microscopy techniques called optical astigmatism and fluorescence source localisation. Using this system, researchers captured real-time, high-resolution images of blood vessels (pictured, left) and blood flow (right) in live mouse brains, with colours depicting varying depths within the tissue and blood flow velocity, respectively. When strokes were induced in these mice, this system captured changes in the shape and function of the brain blood vessels, demonstrating the potential of this approach for investigating disease in real time and in fine detail.

Written by Lux Fatimathas

Lux Fatimathas

Writer

Having pursued science through a career in research, communications and publishing, she is currently a writer and editor for a healthcare marketing agency and also juggles freelance science writing.

• Image from work by Quanyu Zhou and Zhenyue Chen, and colleagues
• Institute of Pharmacology and Toxicology, Faculty of Medicine, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
• Image originally published with a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
• Published in Nature Communications, December 2022