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Technology
OpenPolScope.org provides access to technology developed at the Marine Biological Laboratory for polarized light imaging. This technology consists of software plugins and hardware components that are typically added to a standard, research grade microscope.
Three imaging modes are supported that image different anisotropic material properties: birefringence, diattenuation and polarized fluorescence. Each mode requires a somewhat different hardware setup and different acquisition and processing algorithms. (See each section for specifics.)
Hardware available from OpenPolScope Resource:
Liquid crystal Universal Compensator with mounting adapter and electronic controller (USB) with operating wavelength: 450 – 700 nm. (see OPS Hardware for more information).
Required hardware components for all modes: Wide-field microscope stand (for best results use strain-free objective and condenser optics); Digital camera supported by Micro-Manager software; Computer with Windows 7, ImageJ, and Micro-Manager installed. For compatible devices, see: www.micro-manager.org.
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Polarized Fluorescence mode combines the molecular specicity of fuorescence tagging with the structural specificity of polarized light analysis. Using individual fuorophores that are rigidly connected to proteins of interest, it enables the detection of small conformational changes within individual proteins or slight angular rearrangements of functional proteins inside living cells.
Sensitivity: = 0.001 anisotropy |
Birefringence imaging can be used to analyze the spatial and temporal variations of the differential phase delay in ordered and transparent materials. It enables the measurement of magnitude and orientation of the slow-axis of birefringence in cellular structures such as microtubules and membranes.
Sensitivity: = 0.05nm retardance |
Diattenuation measures how ab-sorptance changes with polarization. Spectrally-resolved diattenuation measurements have the potential to provide specificity to molecular order and molecular composition, such as pigments in photo-receptors.
Sensitivity: = 0.001 anisotropy |
Products available on OpenPolScope.org complement commercial products using LC-PolScope technology that was developed and patented by the Marine Biological Laboratory (US Patents 5,521,705; 7,202,950; 7,239,388; 7,372,567) and licensed to Cambridge Research and Instrumentation (CRi), Inc., now part of PerkinElmer. The Oosight™ product line, which uses LC-PolScope Technology, was acquired by Hamilton Thorne, Inc.
For instrumentation available from PerkinElmer, click here.
For instrumentation available from Hamilton Thorne, Inc., click here.
OpenPolScope can support legacy hardware from CRi.