Speakers
Invited Speaker
Biomedicine increasingly depends on multiscale, multimodal measurements that connect cellular-level information to mesoscale tissue architecture, because key aspects of tissue behaviour and disease progression emerge from interactions across length scales. In this talk, I will present a range of laboratory-based X ray phase contrast approaches that enable stain free, three-dimensional characterisation of soft tissue, spanning from mesoscopic context down to subcellular structure.
I will first introduce intensity modulation phase contrast X ray microscopy for quantitative, high resolution 3D imaging. This approach enables virtual histology in mm3 soft tissue specimens, supporting direct measurement of electron density and morphology of cells’ nuclei in 3D. I will show how machine learning algorithms can be used for virtual Haematoxylin and Eosin (H&E) staining, yielding volumetric datasets compatible with existing histopathological analysis tools. I will show how the microscope’s multimodal nature enables us to combine quantitative electron‑density maps with the dark‑field channel that is sensitive to sub‑micron/nanoscale structure, effectively mapping complementary aspects of tissue microarchitecture at the nanoscale, including extracellular‑matrix features at the single‑cell level.
Finally, I will describe a multiscale imaging workflow that integrates complementary laboratory phase contrast methods to move from whole specimen context to targeted, high resolution visualisation of regions of interest. I will conclude by demonstrating how microscale 3D structure can be used to inform computational fluid dynamics–based estimates of permeability, and how these measurements can be upscaled to mesoscale models that support decision-making in clinically motivated applications, including localised therapy design.