Tuesday 5 January
14:14 – 14:15
Session One: QC/QA of Light Microscopes
14:15 – 14:20
Introduction to QC/QA of Light MIcroscopes and Update on RMS -QC-FIG: Progress During 2020
14:30 – 14:40
Micro-Meta App: An Interactive Software to Facilitate the Collection of OME-compliant Microscopy Metadata Based on Community-Driven Specifications.
15:05 – 15:10
Imaris 9.6 – Classify Your World (IMARIS)
Imaris 9.6 – Classify Your World (IMARIS)
Session One
Presenter: Nick Jones
As biologists we use classification to better understand the living world around us. Classification allows us to simplify the variations we perceive, from the extensive taxonomy of organisms to the various types of endosomes in cells to the grouping of phenotypes in our experiments. Imaris 9.6 makes the classification of objects detected in your images easier than before with new tools including Machine Learning. Not only is assigning a class to the objects found in your image easier, but also the reporting and presentation of the differences across classes.
The power of Imaris 9.6 lies in the enhanced simplicity and new capabilities for downstream analysis. Analysing your data within regions of interest, splitting objects into several classes based on their properties or neighbourhood, comparing the classes is the most straight forward thing now. This unique functionality is built on a combination of several features:
- Machine Learning Object Classifier with new machine learning statistics
- Classification Step in Spot and Surface Creation wizards (1D, 2D and Machine Learning)
- New statistics to describe Spots density
- Comparison between classes within Vantage 1D and new 2D Scatterplot
The presentation given by Dr. Nick Jones will bring an overview of the latest introduced features in the Imaris software.
Speakers
Nick Jones
15:10 – 15:15
Huygens Everywhere and the New Workflow Processor (Scientific Volume Imaging)
Huygens Everywhere and the New Workflow Processor (Scientific Volume Imaging)
Session One
Presenter: Vincent Schoonderwoert
Huygens new Workflow Processor lets you to design a specific image processing pipeline for many images and folders of images. Operations like changing image dimensions, deconvolution, cropping, chromatic aberration correction, drift correction, file format conversion, etcetera, can simply be dragged and dropped into one workflow for batch processing. Huygens Workflow processor ensures that all images are processed similarly and can be compared in a reliable manner.
Access to all Huygens packages is now greatly facilitated with Huygens Everywhere. Huygens Everywhere is a new flexible way of accessing the existing Huygens packages: Localizer, Essential, and Professional wherever you are using a personal login. Whether you work from home, in the office or while traveling, simply start Huygens, login, and get the best results from your microscopy data. Now also available as a subscription plan.
Speakers
Vincent Schoonderwoert
15:15 – 15:20
Flexible Microscopy in the Lab for Everyone (Thermo Fisher Scientific)
15:30 – 15:40
Crib Talk: A New Imaging Facility at West of Scotland – the Glasgow Imaging Facility
16:00 – 16:10
Crib Talk: The Successes and Challenges of Incorporating Non-Commercial Lightsheet Microscopes into an Existing Shared Resource
16:30 – 16:35
Ti2-LAPP: The Ultimate System for Flexibility and Expandability (Nikon)
16:35 – 16:40
ZEISS Lattice Lightsheet - New Frontiers in Live Cell Imaging (Zeiss)
ZEISS Lattice Lightsheet - New Frontiers in Live Cell Imaging (Zeiss)
Session Two
Presenter: Jonathan Shewring
Lightsheet microscopy is a well-established technique, which offers fast and gentle imaging of live and fixed samples. However, the limitation of achievable resolution led Nobel Laureate, Eric Betzig to develop Lattice Lightsheet microscopy. Lattice Lightsheet offers all the benefits of a Lightsheet microscopy, fast acquisition and extremely gentle imaging, while providing subcellular resolution – making it the perfect tool for observing fast processes in live cells.
The ZEISS Lattice Lightsheet redefines speed when it comes to live cell imaging, measuring in volumes per second, instead of frames per second. The system can run at 3 vol/second while offering resolution of 290 x 290 x 450 nm in xy and z respectively. Depending on your needs, you decide whether to use this to monitor fast processes continuously or monitor cell for multiple days, all at high resolution and without photobleaching or affecting the physiology of your cells.
The ZEISS Lattice Lightsheet builds on the achievements of Eric Betzig and brings with it a flexible and easy to user system. The ZEISS Lattice lightsheet has been carefully engineered with the end users in mind, providing an inverted microscope that can utilise a wide variety of sample carriers used for high resolution microscopy without needing to adapt your sample preparation. Helping new users to bring samples and start collecting data quickly and easily.
The technology under pinning the ZEISS Lattice Lightsheet is cutting edge but with all the necessary components being motorised, calibrations for the system are all automated. Making running and operation of the system simple and easy.
The ZEISS Lattice Lightsheet brings the cutting-edge speed and gentleness of Lattice Lightsheet, with the flexibility and ease of use that allows all your users to benefit from it.
Speakers
Jonathan Shewring
16:40 – 16:45
Imaging in the era of COVID-19 - how to work smarter with the ImageXpress Pico (Molecular Devices)
Imaging in the era of COVID-19 - how to work smarter with the ImageXpress Pico (Molecular Devices)
Session Two
As cell imaging is a crucial tool for the advancement of scientific research, it is important to decide on the right imager to meet your requirements, to work smarter and easily obtain the results you need. The COVID-19 outbreak made us realize how important it is to work remotely and with the ImageXpress Pico System you can accelerate your research whilst minimizing your time in the lab.
We invite you to meet the ImageXpress Pico Automated Cell Imaging System by Molecular Devices, a ready-to-go-solution which combines high-resolution imaging with simple but powerful analysis. Whether running fluorescence imaging or brightfield assays, the ImageXpress Pico features comprehensive preconfigured protocols to shorten the learning curve, so you can start running experiments quickly.
With the icon-driven, user-friendly CellReporterXpress® Image Acquisition and Analysis Software, you can capture and analyze images with minimal training on a multitude of assays including viral studies, apoptosis, mitochondrial evaluation, 3D cell models, live cell/ time-lapse, and neurite tracing.
The browser-based software allows you to control the system remotely, minimizing your time in front of the instrument. You can safely go back to your desk to optimize the acquisition settings or work on your data analysis. There is no need to export your images since you have access to your data anywhere and anytime. With a few clicks you can use an array of visualization tools to easily share and discuss your results: heatmap, tables, data view, scatter plots; all with drill-down to the images for data verification.
Thanks to its remote-control capability, the ImageXpress Pico is also an ideal tool for Biosafety level labs which require more stringent control measures.
You only need to be in front of this imager to add your sample. Is this still too much? The ImageXpress Pico can also be integrated with a robotic automation solution to handle multiple plate acquisitions while you work on something else.
The system’s lab-friendly price allows researchers to afford the convenience of automated imaging and analysis on their lab bench. With options like environmental control, Digital Confocal 2D on-the-fly deconvolution, z-stack acquisition or robotic automation, the system can be configured to meet your research needs.
Speakers
Matteo Cattaneo
Wednesday 6 January
10:29 – 10:30
UK 'State of the Nation' Session
11:30 – 11:35
BioImagingUK Discussion
11:35 – 11:40
SRRF-Stream+ - Real-time live cell super-resolution microscopy just got even better (Andor)
SRRF-Stream+ - Real-time live cell super-resolution microscopy just got even better (Andor)
UK Centric Session
Presenter: Alan Mullan
Product Specialist for Microscopy Cameras at Andor Technology
Much of the structure and processes of the cell are masked from view below the classical diffraction limit of light-based imaging microscopy. Super-resolution techniques such as STORM, PALM, STED and SIM have smashed past this barrier and enable cell biology to be studied in considerably more detail.
There are some limitations to these techniques: costly equipment, high illumination intensities or need to use specialised fluorophores. SRRF (Super-resolution Radial Fluctuations) offers an alternative approach that counters many of these limitations (Gustafsson et al 2016). Of particular interest, it allows for super resolution at low illumination intensities, using standard fluorophores on a conventional microscope. One development of SRRF is SRRF-Stream. This version is exclusive to Andor Technology and optimizes GPU processing to unlock real-time live super-resolution from a microscope. Since its introduction SRRF-Stream has proven to be popular on both the Dragonfly multi-modal confocal systems as well as standard widefield microscopes.
We now present an updated version of SRRF-Stream called “SRRF-Stream+” which allows for improvements in image quality. This has been achieved by improving the radiality step used during localisation processing. We also demonstrate SRRF-Stream+ works very effectively on the Andor Sona back-illuminated sCMOS camera series – previous versions of SRRF-Stream having been restricted to iXon EMCCD cameras only. These latest developments add to the previous benefits of SRRF-Stream that made it popular, making it an even more flexible and useful tool in the microscopists’ imaging toolbox.
Speakers
Alan Mullan
11:40 – 11:45
Addressing the Challenges of High Speed Scientific Imaging with the Kinetix SCMOS (Teledyne)
Addressing the Challenges of High Speed Scientific Imaging with the Kinetix SCMOS (Teledyne)
UK Centric Session
Presenter: Dan Croucher
Scientific cameras used in high speed microscopy applications put a large emphasis on high speed data collection. However, achieving faster frame rates usually means creating a smaller region of interest and sacrificing imaging area. Furthermore, the low exposure times required results in fewer photons captured per pixel which can give poor quality images. In this short talk, we show how modern camera technology like the new Kinetix sCMOS addresses these challenges.
Speakers
Daniel Croucher
11:45 – 11:50
Near-IR Upgrade for FluoView FV3000 (Olympus)
13:59 – 14:00
Session Four: Training in the current and post- Covid-19 era
14:30 – 14:45
Emergency and Disaster Recovery: A CRUK MI Perspective Flood, Fire and COVID
14:45 – 15:00
Strategies for Rapid Development and Implementation of Virtual Microscopy Training
15:00 – 15:05
Next-Generation Live Cell Assays with Livecyte (Phasefocus)
Next-Generation Live Cell Assays with Livecyte (Phasefocus)
Session Four
Presenter: Dr. Martin Humphry
In this talk we will briefly show, via a software demo, how easy it is to gain powerful insights into cell behaviour and drug responses in live-cell assays using a Livecyte Kinetic Cytometer.
Livecyte is the only commercial instrument optimised for high-content long-term live cell assays with automated cell tracking. Label-free imaging, with extremely low power illumination means that even the most sensitive cells can be imaged for days or weeks at time without adverse effects. With Phasefocus’s patented Ptychographic quantitative phase imaging technology at its core, Livecyte can produce high contrast “fluorescence-like” images, without the phototoxic effects. These images are ideally suited to automated segmentation and single cell tracking, enabling the morphology and motion of statistically significant numbers of cells to be monitored over time, in up to 96 well plate format. Powerful, integrated analysis software helps you to make sense of such deep data, from the assay-level Dashboards which give you an overview of different types of phenotypic behaviour in your populations at the click of a button, to deep-diving right down to individuals within those populations and how they behave. We’ll show just how easy this is with a software demonstration.
Figure 1 - A Livecyte Kinetic Cytometer
Make faster decisions, and quickly uncover phenotypic differences, with graphical proliferation, morphology, scratch-wound and motility dashboards, available immediately after each experiment. Add in correlative fluorescence measurements (up to 7 channels) and that makes Livecyte the most comprehensive live cell analysis instrument on the market. Find out more at Phasefocus.com/livecyte.
Figure 2 - Livecyte's Random Motility Dashboard
Speakers
Martin Humphry
15:05 – 15:10
Unity Life- the All in One Laser Free Bench Top Confocal for Live Cell Imaging (Aurox)
Unity Life- the All in One Laser Free Bench Top Confocal for Live Cell Imaging (Aurox)
Session Four
Unity life – the all in one laser free bench top confocal for live cell imaging
Presenter: Dr Phillipa Timmins
In these troubling times, when space, funding and time are at a premium and when confocal imaging is becoming increasingly important, we are pleased to introduce unity life.
Unity life is a laser free, compact, bench top spinning disk confocal with dimensions of just 482 x 222 x 396 mm and weighing around 25kg. Everything is integrated inside including: LED light source, sCMOS detector, computer, motorised x, y and z, 37oC incubator (with integrated humidity and CO2 sensors) and the whole thing is controlled by an iPad. Auto calibrating and with its own antivibration suspension, simply plug in the power lead, connect to your lab CO2 supply and you are ready to go.
The unity range is designed to sit on a bench in a lab, or in an unused corner of a core facility. Whether you are dealing with fixed or live cells, tissue sections or model organisms, unity will enable you to collect quality confocal images while freeing up time on your more sophisticated instrumentation.
Speakers
Phillipa Timmins
15:10 – 15:15
New eight-channel LED Illumination System with Lightning Fast TTL Control (CoolLED)
New eight-channel LED Illumination System with Lightning Fast TTL Control (CoolLED)
Session Four
Presenter: Lynsey Burton
This presentation will discuss the new 8-channel pE-800 LED Illumination System from CoolLED, describing how it can help deliver the highest quality data at minimum total cost of ownership.
The pE-800 is a breakthrough for live cell imaging, with comprehensive control options of all eight channels, individually or in any combination. Sensitive samples are protected against phototoxicity and photobleaching, while several advanced features enable high-speed imaging and the capture of dynamic events with the highest temporal resolution. In this talk, you will also learn about the unique 8-channel Sequence Runner which transforms a manual microscope into an affordable and powerful eight-channel automated imaging system.
The compact pE-800 builds on award-winning CoolLED technology, with stable and reliable performance, ultra-low power consumption and liquid light guide delivery ensuring compatibility with all major microscope models.
Join Lynsey Burton as she introduces the new pE-800 and its benefits for all users of the system.
Speakers
Lynsey Burton
15:14 – 15:15
Session Five: Measuring Imaging Impacts/ Success Metrics
15:15 – 15:30
Global BioImaging Recommendations for Measuring Imaging Facility Impact
16:15 – 16:20
Onwards and Upwards, Added Value from your CFMS (Stratocore)
16:20 – 16:25
Optimize Core Facility Operations with Insight (Idea Elan)
16:25 – 16:30
Safety and Compliance in Advanced Microscopy Facilities During a Pandemic (Agendo)
16:29 – 16:30
Session Six: Virtual Coffee Meetings
16:30 – 16:40
Networking in a LM Facility: Value Gained from Sharing Across Broad Experiences
16:50 – 17:00
Mentoring for Life Microscopy Applications
17:00 – 17:20
Discussion About Setting Up a Regular Meeting/Chat Room Across Regions (Mentoring) (Coffee Club)
