Tuesday, January 30, 2007

Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, discovered a breakthrough imaging method. This method is called quantitative phase imaging, it allows researchers to view live cell membranes and create images of the internal systems of living cells and even their movements without sample pre-processing! Hopefully this newly discovered method will one day enable researchers to develop a greater understanding of diseases such as sickle cell anemia and malaria. Up to this time, the researchers have been able to create images with a resolution of 0.2 nm in normal laboratory conditions with no isolation or stabilization of the laboratory microscope. Though this QPI technique hasn't reached the level of resolution that other microscopes offer, maybe some day it will.