Diffraction Limit
RSS feedVideo Talk by Kurt Thorn: The Abbe Diffraction Experiment
This lecture describes the famous experiments of Ernst Abbe which showed how diffraction of light by a specimen (and interference with the illuminating light) gives rise to an image and how collection…Read article
TIRF Publication List
This monthly updated references list presents current papers using Leica AM TIRF in the major application fields for TIRF microscopy.Read article
Microscope Resolution: Concepts, Factors and Calculation
In microscopy, the term ‘resolution’ is used to describe the ability of a microscope to distinguish detail. In other words, this is the minimum distance at which two distinct points of a specimen can…Read article
Translation Microscopy (TRAM) for Super-Resolution Imaging
Super-resolution microscopy is transforming our understanding of biology but accessibility is limited by its technical complexity, high costs and the requirement for bespoke sample preparation. We…Read article
HyVolution – Super-Resolution Imaging with a Confocal Microscope
Since the invention of the microscope, there has been continual discussion about the possibility of showing more detailed features of specimens as compared to just magnifying them. In this article we…Read article
Video: Fluorescence is a State of Mind
How to break a fundamental law of physics and win a Nobel Prize to boot. Stefan Hell explains super-resolved fluorescence microscopy for which he shared the 2014 Nobel Prize in chemistry.Read article
A Brief History of Light Microscopy – From the Medieval Reading Stone to Super-Resolution
The history of microscopy begins in the Middle Ages. As far back as the 11th century, plano-convex lenses made of polished beryl were used in the Arab world as reading stones to magnify manuscripts.…Read article
Gated STED Microscopy with Time-gated Single-photon Avalanche Diode
The maximization of the useful (within the time gate) photon flux is then an important aspect to obtain super-resolved STED images. Here we show that by using a fast-gated single-photon avalanche…Read article
STED Nanoscopy: A Glimpse into the Future
The well-known saying of "Seeing is believing" became even more apt in biology when stimulated emission depletion (STED) nanoscopy was introduced in 1994 by the Nobel laureate S. Hell and coworkers.…Read article
Pathways to Optical STED Microscopy
STED nanoscopy has evolved to a highly versatile tool for the observation of the living cell, more and more finding its way into state-of-the-art optical imaging facilities in biomedical research…Read article
Video Talk by Daniel Axelrod: Total Internal Reflection Fluorescence (TIRF) Microscopy
Total Internal Reflection Fluorescence (TIRF) Microscopy is a technique that only illuminates dye molecules near a surface. In this video, the pioneer of TIRF Microscopy describes what this technique…Read article
GSDIM Publication List
GSDIM microscopy is a widefield super-resolution technique based on the localization of fluorophores with nanometer precision. With its help a lateral resolution of down to 20 nm can be achieved,…Read article
Super-Resolution – On a Heuristic Point of View About the Resolution of a Light Microscope
Since super-resolution has become one of the most favored methods in biomedical research, the term has become increasingly popular. Still, there is much of confusion about what is super-resolution and…Read article
Finding, Defining and Breaking the Diffraction Barrier in Microscopy – A Historical Perspective
Diffraction plays a crucial role in microscopy as it prevents the recording of arbitrarily sharp images with conventional light microscopes. Many names are connected with the notion of diffraction and…Read article
Super-Resolution Microscopy – Get Your Free e-Book for Download
Until recently, the diffraction of light had placed a fundamental limit on how far biologists could peer into cells with optical microscopes, preventing them from resolving features less than 250 nm…Read article
3D STED (Stimulated Emission Depletion) Microscopy
The resolution needed to image subcellular architecture and dynamics in light microscopy is hindered by the diffraction limits as described by Ernst Abbe. Simply stated, structures smaller than 200…Read article
Nobel Prize in Chemistry for Achievements in Super-Resolution Microscopy
On October 8th 2014, The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has decided to award the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for 2014 to Eric Betzig, Stefan W. Hell and William E. Moerner "for the development of…Read article
Video Interview with Stefan Hell, the Inventor of Super-Resolution
Professor Stefan Hell is director at the Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry and head of the department of NanoBiophotonics in Goettingen and widely considered as the father of…Read article
Video Talk by Jeff Lichtman: Resolution in Microscopy – Wave Optics and the Diffraction Limit
Light has properties of particles and waves. Understanding the wave nature of light is essential to understanding the workings of a microscope. This lecture describes Huygens Wavelets,…Read article
STED Microscopy of Living Cells – New Frontiers in Membrane and Neurobiology
Recent developments in fluorescence far-field microscopy such as STED microscopy have accomplished observation of the living cell with a spatial resolution far below the diffraction limit. Here, we…Read article
Video Talk on Super-Resolution: Overview and Stimulated Emission Depletion (STED) Microscopy
Historically, light microscopy has been limited in its ability to resolve closely spaced objects, with the best microscopes only able to resolve objects separated by 200 nm or more. This limit is…Read article
Interview with Stefan Hell: Breaking Nanoscale Boundaries
Stefan Hell is credited with having conceived and applied the first viable concept for breaking Abbe’s diffraction limit in a light-focusing microscope. He is a scientific member of the Max Planck…Read article
STED and GSDIM: Diffraction Unlimited Resolution for all Types of Fluorescence Imaging
This article gives an overview of two different types of superresolution techniques. Stimulated emission depletion (STED) microscopy is a versatile and fast method that is based on point scanning…Read article
Widefield Super-Resolution with GSDIM
Great advancements in biology have been possible by using fluorescence microscopy. So far, the resolution of the images was limited due to physical constraints. In the past couple of years, new…Read article
Gated STED Microscopy with CW-STED Lasers
Among the major steps in the development of Stimulated Emission Depletion (STED) microscopy, the demonstration of the use continuous wave lasers (CW-STED) was certainly contributing the most to a wide…Read article
Total Internal Reflection Fluorescence (TIRF) Microscopy
Total internal reflection fluorescence (TIRF) is a special technique in fluorescence microscopy developed by Daniel Axelrod at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor in the early 1980s. TIRF microscopy…Read article
Applications of TIRF Microscopy in Life Science Research
The special feature of TIRF microscopy is the employment of an evanescent field for fluorophore excitation. Unlike standard widefield fluorescence illumination procedures with arc lamps, LEDs or…Read article
Sharp Live Images from the Mouse Brain
To explore the most intricate structures of the brain in order to decipher how it functions – Stefan Hell’s team of researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry in Göttingen has…Read article
Videos on STED Microscopy and its Inventor Stefan Hell
Here we present an collection of videos telling the story of the invention of nanometer-scale microscopy by Stefan Hell and explaining the basic principle of STED microscopy.Read article
How Widefield Super-Resolution GSDIM Images are Created
The localization microscopy technique GSDIM is a proven technology to achieve super-resolution images with a resolution of up to 20 nm. In the following tutorial we will describe the basic principles…Read article
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