You are invited to participate in “Microscopy Month”
During the period between mid-August to mid-September all four of the major optical microscope vendors will be doing on-site demonstrations of very well equipped research-grade microscopes.
Why?
The managers of the RII Imaging Cores – Optical are evaluating microscopes, along with our faculty oversight committee, for a planned application to the UA’s equipment enhancement fund for core facilities, due September 28, 2022. The microscope would go in our core facility, probably in Life Sciences North.
We are looking for a fully-motorized, computer-controlled widefield microscope with a color camera and a high-end fluorescence camera. The microscope would be similar to the popular Leica DMI6000 that we already have, with a few distinctives. The rationale for a second, somewhat similar, microscope is to avoid potentially overloading the schedule of existing Leica.
- Stereology software – A recent faculty hire has been promised stereology software from MBF Biosciences to be installed either on the DMI6000 or possibly on the proposed new microscope. The new software controls the microscope and cameras directly, acquiring images and performing the analyses on those images in real time. Stereology is an unbiased form of image analysis that relies on the math found in geometry and statistics. The technique is often used by brain and lung researchers, but it is not limited to those organs. For more information, see: https://www.stereology.info/stereology/
- Confocal-like images – We will be evaluating three microscopes with deconvolution software and one with a hardware structured illumination approach to obtaining crisp fluorescence images. Both approaches are robust and have been used in publications for many years. One of our goals is to provide a way for UAHS labs with thin samples (e.g., paraffin sectioned tissue or cultured cells) to obtain confocal-like fluorescence images without needing to travel to the very popular confocal microscope found in the Marley facility.
Who should come?
- If you are interested in the issues related to the distinctives above, please come (or at least reach out to us at opticalimaging@arizona.edu). We are looking for user feedback! We need to identify potential users of both distinctives to justify our proposal, we will be surveying vistors afterwards.
- If your lab is thinking about getting a microscope or you might want one in the near future, come take a look. Don’t miss this amazing opportunity to check out the image quality using your own samples, to take a good look at the software, and to talk to the vendors in person.
Where?
Three of the on-site demonstrations will be held in Life Sciences North, room 429. The Nikon demonstration will be in the UA Cancer Center, room 0930. The MBF Biosciences workshop location is currently TBD.
Schedule (as of 8:00am, September 1, 2022 - this may be the final update)
| Dates | Vendor | Location | Details | Contact/Schedule |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Aug 16-18, 2022 | Leica Microsystems (NCI/Thomas Scientific) |
Life Sciences North 429 | DMi8 inverted microscope with color & fluorescence cameras and the Thunder deconvolution software |
To schedule an appointment, reach out to: For more information, download the Leica Thunder flier. |
| Aug 23-24, 2022 | Nikon Instruments | UA Cancer Center, 0930 | Inverted microscope with color & fluorescence cameras and deconvolution software |
Chris Miller - 602-363-9689, cmiller@nikon.net Click this link to schedule a Nikon demonstration appointment. For more information, download the NIKON flier. |
|
Sept 7-8, 2022 |
Evident (Olympus) | Life Sciences North 429 | IX83 fully motorized inverted microscope with color and fluorescence, laser based auto-focus, filter wheels for full spectral separation in fluorescence (DAPI to Cy7). Software package includes deconvolution, AI tissue detection, and image analysis for count & measure data output. Sample range: 35 mm dish to 96 well plate, slide scanning at 4-slide capacity. |
William Vincent - 480-356-4316, william.vincent@olympus.com |
| Sept 13-14, 2022 |
Zeiss Microscopy
(CTK Instruments)
|
Life Sciences North 429 | Axio Observer 7 with motorized stage, Colibri 7 illuminator, Apotome III and 2 cameras (one color, one monochrome). Includes the Zeiss AI sample finder (YouTube video) which can automatically detect your sample on a glass slide to make it easy to set up automated tiling routines. It can also detect certain sample carriers such as multi-well plates which eliminates the need to calibrate the system when you place a new sample carrier on the stage. |
Todd Schreiber - 866-464-1005 x111, todd@ctk-instruments.com |
| Sept 15, 2022 | MBF Bioscience |
9am-12pm |
Stereology workshop - introduction to stereology and probes (the structured way that stereology samples the objects of interest) along with demonstrations of how to use the optical fractionator probe. To register - please email Doug Cromey (dcromey@arizona.edu) |
Mark Barton - mark@mbfbioscience.com |