Science Lab

Learn. Share. Contribute. The knowledge portal of Leica Microsystems. Find scientific research and teaching material on the subject of microscopy. The portal supports beginners, experienced practitioners and scientists alike in their everyday work and experiments. Explore interactive tutorials and application notes, discover the basics of microscopy as well as high-end technologies. Become part of the Science Lab community and share your expertise.

History, Developments and Trends of Microscopy in Cancer Research

Cancer is a global disease, with 18 million new cases diagnosed and 10 million cancer-related deaths worldwide in 2020. This burden is set to increase, with a projected increase in cases of ~55% by…

Mouse fibroblasts where F-actin is labelled with FITC (green), tubulin with Cy5 (red), and nuclei with DAPI (blue). Image courtesy of Dr. Günter Giese, Max Planck Institute for Medical Research, Heidelberg, Germany.

Overview of Fluorescent Dyes in terms of Applications and Properties

An introduction to commonly used fluorescent dyes and an overview of their characteristics are given in this article. Fluorescence microscopy is used for the study of specific cellular components with…

Predictive Service Prevents Downtime in Ghent

At the VIB BioImaging Core in Ghent, Belgium, researchers depend on Leica’s Stellaris 8 confocal microscope to explore the frontiers of biomedical science. When Leica’s RemoteCare system detected a…

Zebrafish heart, DAPI (nuclei, blue), Tropomyosin (cardiomyocytes, red) and GFP (primordial cardiac layer, green). Courtesy of Anna Jazwinska, University of Fribourg, Switzerland.

A Guide to Fluorescence Microscopy

Fluorescence microscopy uses the ability of fluorophores, dyes, or fluorescent proteins to emit light of a specific wavelength after being excited with light of a shorter wavelength. Biomolecules can…

Virally labeled neurons (red) and astrocytes (green) in a cortical spheroid derived from human induced pluripotent stem cells. THUNDER Model Organism Imager with a 2x, 0.15 NA objective at 3.4x zoom was used to produce this 425 µm Z-stack (26 positions) which is presented here as an Extended Depth of Field (EDoF) projection. Images courtesy of Dr. F. Birey, Dr. S. Pasca laboratory, Palo Alto, CA.

Guide to Live-Cell Imaging

For a wide range of applications in various research fields of life science, live-cell imaging is an indispensable tool for visualizing cells in a state as close to in vivo, i.e. living and active, as…

Shown is the DMi8 inverted microscope which is used for life-science research.

Factors to Consider When Selecting a Research Microscope

An optical microscope is often one of the central devices in a life-science research lab. It can be used for various applications which shed light on many scientific questions. Thereby the…

Image of roundworm C. elegans acquired with a M205 FA fluorescence automated stereo microscope in combination with Rottermann contrast. Areas labelled with mCherry are seen as reddish purple.

A Guide to C. elegans Research – Working with Nematodes

Efficient microscopy techniques for C. elegans research are outlined in this guide. As a widely used model organism with about 70% gene homology to humans, the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans (also…

Optic nerve regeneration in the Xenopus laevis tadpole.

A Novel Laser-Based Method for Studying Optic Nerve Regeneration

Optic nerve regeneration is a major challenge in neurobiology due to the limited self-repair capacity of the mammalian central nervous system (CNS) and the inconsistency of traditional injury models.…

A fruit fly (Drosophila melanogaster) observed with an Ivesta 3 stereo microscope during fly pushing (sorting of the flies). The scale bar length is 1 mm. Image courtesy of M. Benton, EMBL, Heidelberg, Germany.

A Guide to Using Microscopy for Drosophila (Fruit Fly) Research

The fruit fly, typically Drosophila melanogaster, has been used as a model organism for over a century. One reason is that many disease-related genes are shared between Drosophila and humans. It is…

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