Anne-Marie Girard, CQLS

CQLS has installed a new Leica Stellaris 5 Confocal Microscope System which replaces an older confocal system. With this type of microscope one can obtain 3D sectioning of fluorescently labeled cells, or tissues for clearer, sharper images of specimens. People have used confocal systems to examine structures within living or fixed cells and to examine the dynamics of cellular processes.

A confocal system has the capacity to image in Z and time to better visualize location in 3D than widefield fluorescence microscope by using a pinhole to eliminate out of focus light. The system has a white light laser (WLL) with tunable excitations from 485 nm up to 685 nm in addition to a 405 nm laser and sensitive HyD S detectors with a detection range from 410 to 850 nm.  Additionally, the Stellaris system also has TauSense, a set of tools based on fluorescence lifetime information with potential to eliminate autofluorescence, and LIGHTNING which expands the extraction of image details for both classical imaging range and beyond the diffraction limit (120nm).

We will be offering free training and imaging time during this fiscal year to those people who have a project ready for imaging and in order to help with grant writing for future imaging projects. Contact Anne-Marie Girard to discuss potential projects or for more information about the system or its capacities.