ioLight has developed a small, affordable and high-quality digital microscope for monitoring cell culture. The product is fully sealed so it can be left inside the chamber and easily sterilised afterwards. It sends images wirelessly to a tablet or computer outside the incubator so that the cell culture can be viewed without opening the incubator and risking damaging the culture.
Having a microscope in the incubator allows for continuous monitoring of cultures, giving insights into cell culture health and early detection of contaminants. This improves yields and allows experiments to be carried out directly in the incubator, providing a stable and contaminant-free environment for long-running assays or delicate 3D cultures.
The compact size of the ioLight inverted microscope also frees up space. Whether that is for other flasks containing the rest of the current batch or the next experiment. The instrument is robust and sealed, so it can operate in the high humidity and CO2 conditions in an incubator and be fully sterilised to prevent contamination after each run.
Furthermore, the ioLight cell culture microscope transmits images wirelessly, so the microscope can simply be placed into an incubator to provide continuous monitoring with timelapse and video capture features. Your cell cultures can be presented in standard Petri dishes, 96 well plates or T-flasks. The microscope has settings for brightfield, Low NA (high contrast), digital phase contrast and darkfield to provide good images even in low-contrast subjects.
The image and YouTube video were taken inside an incubator. They clearly show the number, motility, confluence and morphology of the cells, providing researchers and technicians with confidence in the health of their experimental cell lines. Our thanks to Dr Mark Willet at The University of Southampton for helping us produce these images.
ioLight is pleased to announce that we are working with Ramboll Group and Lake Associations in Wisconsin and New York State to identify the toxic algae that contaminate lakes, rivers and oceans worldwide.
Many algal blooms are in fact harmless, but a safe diagnosis requires a microscope and an expert. Lake Association members often drive samples long distances to the Lab to have their samples checked so that their lake can be reopened. It can be several days to confirm that the lake is safe.
Ramboll spinout, BloomOptix is developing an Artificial Intelligence app to give an instant result on a mobile phone. The expert app is currently being trained using images from lake associations in Wisconsin and New York State. Samples are collected from the lake and placed on the platform of an ioLight pocket microscope and saved onto a mobile phone for analysis. The app will cut the time to diagnose Harmful Algal Blooms from days to minutes. This will maximise the time we can enjoy our beaches and reduce losses to businesses that rely on tourism.
Andrew Monk, CEO of ioLight says “the ioLight microscope is compact and simple for anyone to use, yet still produces high enough quality images for the BloomOptix app to identify toxic algae”. Bryan Arndt, Managing Consultant at Ramboll Water says “The ioLight microscope is twice the quality and half the price of other microscopes we tested.”
ioLight microscope counting algae on a lakeside in the Yahara River watershed, Wisconsin. Image courtesy of Bob Bertra Clean Lake Alliance.
About Ramboll
Ramboll is a global engineering, architecture and consultancy company founded in Denmark in 1945.
Their 16,000 experts create sustainable solutions across Buildings; Transport; Water; Environment & Health; Architecture, Landscape & Urbanism; Energy and Management Consulting.
Across the world, Ramboll combines local experience with a global knowledge base to create sustainable cities and societies. They combine insights with the power to drive positive change to our clients, in the form of ideas that can be realised and implemented.
ioLight has patented the only pocket microscope that can share images of single-cell organisms such as algae and diatoms. ioLight’s solutions allow professional and amateur scientists to measure the effects of climate change such as Harmful Algal Blooms.
ioLight’s customers have taken their microscopes to The Arctic, Antarctic, The Amazon and even up Mount Everest where conventional microscopes cannot be used.
ioLight’s Magnificent Mobile Microscope goes wherever researchers go.
Cells grown in labs are a mainstay of biomedical research. Scientists have available to them a wide variety of carefully selected cells, cultivated from animals and humans. These cells can be grown in the lab so that scientists can test potential therapies, drugs and vaccines on appropriately selected cells to see the effect and then infer what might be the effect when used on live humans and animals.
A cell line is created by harvesting some cells from an animal or human and growing them in flasks. As the cells grow they multiply, and so by continually cultivating the cells, there is a constant supply of new cells identical to the original cells.
There are a large variety of cell lines for various parts of many animals. Each is suitable for different types of experiments and for investigating different biological processes. For example, the CHO-K1 cell line is epithelial cells that come from a particular Chinese Hamster’s Ovary (hence CHO) and is commonly used to test protein therapeutics. Calu-3 is another example of a cell line – this was originally taken from an individual human lung cancer, and so when it is used in the lab, it is often used to investigate and test cancer therapies.
Cells are widely used across a variety of biomedical research topics, but regardless of the research topic, the cell culture techniques required are very similar. A whole industry has grown up to provide cell culture techniques and equipment.
Cells need very carefully controlled conditions to grow successfully, to provide these conditions an incubator is used. The incubator promotes cell growth by maintaining the optimum temperature, humidity, and often atmosphere. Cells typically take between many hours and days to grow, and for the effects of the experiments to be visible. Thus the cells need to be imaged regularly over the course of hours/days both to determine a) that the cells are growing as expected and b) to see the effect of the experiment on the cells. Conventionally this is done by removing the flask from the incubator, putting it on a microscope and looking at the cells. However moving the flask and taking it out of the controlled incubator environment adversely affects the cells, so images are recorded infrequently to minimise the disruption to the cells.
What is Live Cell Imaging?
Live Cell Imaging refers to recording microscope images of the cells without moving the cell culture flask or removing it from the incubator. This minimises failed experiments and enables the scientist to better track the effect of the experiment on the cells. This improves the quality of the data and gives a better understanding of the experiment.
Conventional microscopes are large, complex and cannot be used inside incubators. Instead, micro-incubator chambers that fit on microscope stages are used. However, this approach is expensive and ties up a valuable bench microscope for the entire duration of the cell culture, which makes this approach impractical for most research projects.
Recently, miniature digital inverted microscopes have become available. These microscopes image cell flasks, dishes or well plates from below and record images whenever the researcher wants without disturbing the cells. They are small enough to fit inside standard incubators, making Live Cell Imaging accessible to a much wider range of budgets.
Many of these inverted incubator microscopes are supplied with sophisticated software to automatically track cell development and provide the researcher with high-level data on the progress of cell growth. This is appropriate for many large scale development labs. However, much cutting-edge research is done by the smaller labs for whom this level of sophistication and cost is not appropriate.
Above: Inverted digital microscope inside an incubator
The images below are taken using a simple low-cost inverted incubator microscope made by ioLight (iolight.co.uk). This microscope fits inside standard incubators and sends images via WiFi to a tablet or computer in the lab. It can record time-lapse images which can be viewed remotely, so the researcher can monitor cells for days without going into the lab or removing the culture from the incubator. This reduces the number of failed cell cultures and provides better data on the results of the experiments.
This type of affordable digital inverted microscope is suitable for imaging a wide variety of cells as well as a myriad of other samples. Some example images of cells are shown below:
Live Cell Imaging: Hepatocytes
Hepatocyte cells make up the majority of the cells of a liver and are involved in a range of functions including protein synthesis and storage and transformation of carbohydrates and formation of bile.
Fibroblasts are cells that synthesize the structural framework for animal tissues. They are the most common cells of animal connective tissue. They are used in a variety of applications including stem cell research, and vaccine development.
These cells are cloned from bone marrow and are particular types of neuronal cells often used to study Parkinson’s disease, neurogenesis and other characteristics of brain cells.
Live Cell Imaging is the best way of ensuring a cell culture is progressing correctly and reduces the time and money wasted on failed cell cultures. Live Cell Imaging also enables the researcher to record better data on the effect of the experiment on the cells, thus improving the quality of research. Until recently Live Cell Imaging has been very expensive and the preserve of large labs. However, simpler Live Cell Imaging devices such as the ioLight inverted microscope are now available. Smaller labs, which are often where much of the cutting edge research is done, can use these new microscopes to access many of the benefits of more costly Live Cell Imagers.
https://iolight.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/IMG_8614-scaled.jpg13332000ioLighthttp://iolight.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/iolight-logo.pngioLight2021-09-02 16:08:192021-09-06 14:35:58Live Cell Imaging on a budget
Biology teachers at colleges and universities around the world are carefully working out how to teach in a post-virus world. A lot of work has been invested in planning teaching scenarios from further lockdowns to a return to the ‘new normal’. Video conferencing and teaching platforms such as Zoom, Classroom and Teams are already a daily part of teaching and learning.
Biology is one of the more difficult subjects in which to plan a new normal. The best teachers inspire their students, showing them samples of organisms at macroscopic and microscopic levels. This encourages their audience to connect biological processes all the way from global ecology to the biochemistry of a cell. The microscope is the key tool in this journey because it connects the global environment to cell biology. With most teaching laboratories closed during lockdown and field trips cancelled, inspirational teaching of biology has become really challenging. Biology teachers are intrinsically creative and many are looking for microscopes that their students could use when the teaching labs are closed.
Microscopes for $20?
Just $20 buys a contact lens that clips onto the camera of a student’s mobile phone. As a general-purpose magnifier, these are great for low magnification applications such as plant structure. With care, they can work in applications that need more magnification over a small area. However, the field of view of clip-on lenses is limited and images are usually surrounded by a black circle and out of focus at the edges. Nevertheless, this is a useful and inexpensive introduction to small animals and plants.
For a slightly larger investment, schools and colleges can purchase a digital magnifier that looks like a flashlight and connects to a computer with a USB cable or WiFi. These devices are either handheld or stand-mounted to give more stability. They often claim x1000 magnification, but in practice, the resolution is typically more like 50 microns – the thickness of a human hair. Which makes them pretty useful for electronics and insect anatomy.
Teaching biology over video
ioLight microscope displaying a high-resolution image on a Zoom conference call
Teaching cell structure needs a resolution of 1 micron and in the past, this was only available from a laboratory compound microscope. UK startup ioLight Ltd has patented a portable microscope with a stage and transmitted illumination. This pocket-sized instrument delivers 1 micron resolution images to any smartphone or tablet ready for sharing or pasting into projects. The performance of the ioLight product is similar to that of a lab microscope with two important differences: it is portable and internet-connected.
The robust ioLight microscope fits in a jacket pocket and can easily be posted to locked-down students for socially distanced field trips at home. The powerful 1 micron resolution allows students to image animal and plant cells, protozoa and algae. In fact, anything that a college laboratory microscope can see. Its portable format makes it perfect for citizen science surveys such as Microplastics or Harmful Algal Blooms (with a proper risk assessment).
The internet connectivity of the ioLight microscope means that video platforms such as Zoom, Classroom and Teams can use it to teach microscopy online, allowing students to see clearly the instructor’s microscope screen. This exciting development allows teachers to deliver microscopy classes online and remotely. ioLight even offers a fluorescence version of its product, which allows colleges and universities to introduce students to one of the central tools of microbiology.
Who knows, perhaps your students could even tag the COVID-19 virus and find a cure.
https://iolight.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/Clipboard09.jpg10781917ioLighthttp://iolight.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/iolight-logo.pngioLight2020-07-16 16:22:122020-08-14 14:05:17Biology teaching in a post virus class
Azimuth Photonics is now an official reseller for ioLight portable microscopes in Russia. Azimuth Photonics is a dynamic, fast-growing distributor of optoelectronic components, devices and research equipment for the photonics industry in Russia. The microscopy department of Azimuth Photonics is focused on sales of laser-optical systems and components for imaging applications such as microscopy, optogenetics, electrophysiology, optical tomography.
ioLight appoints Azimuth Photonics to sell its high-resolution pocket microscopes in Russia
ioLight has patented the only pocket microscope that instantly shares images of cells. Target markets are climate research and remote diagnostics of animals plants and humans. Hundreds of the world’s leading scientists are using the ioLight microscope in remote locations like The Amazon Rainforest, Antarctica and the Kazakh steppe. National Geographic® recently filmed the product at 5,300m on Mount Everest, the highest altitude microscope on earth.
ioLight was incorporated in 2014 and is now growing its sales network to provide lab quality portable microscopes to researchers on every continent. ioLight’s microscopes are also the perfect tool to draw visitors to exhibition stands, displaying real-time video onto a standard TV monitor.
Andrew Monk, CEO of ioLight says “We are delighted to be working with such an experienced team for portable microscopes in Russia. There are many so many scientists and clinicians working remotely in such a diverse country and they need high-resolution microscopes in their pockets.” Vyacheslav Timoshin, Sales Director at Azimuth Photonics says “We believe that there is a niche market for digital pocket microscopes to use for biology in farms, fields and expeditions when it is necessary to image a fresh untreated sample.” He continues: “We are excited to offer Russian researchers ioLight microscopes which are pocket-sized and display beautiful 1 micron resolution images on a mobile phone or a tablet for immediate sharing.”
https://iolight.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/camping-field-research-iolight.jpg12801920ioLighthttp://iolight.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/iolight-logo.pngioLight2020-06-08 16:27:522020-06-09 12:19:26Azimuth Photonics appointed to sell ioLight Portable Microscopes in Russia
Phycologist Francis Bunker reviewed the ioLight microscope in edition 97 of the Phycologist – the Newsletter of the British Phycological Society.
If you type Phycology into Google it unhelpfully returns ‘do you mean psychology?’ No we don’t! Phychology is the study of algae, a large, fascinating group of photosynthetic organisms ranging in size from the microscopic single cell species up to the enormous kelp that form forests on the ocean floor. As with most branches of botany, pychology is a vital indicator of the health of the environment and of global warming, so we were keen to hear what Francis would make of our portable microscope.
Francis using ioLight microscope
Francis took the ioLight microscope to Hazelbeach to try on some fieldwork he was doing for Natural Recourses Wales surveying seaweed on the rocky shore of Pembrokeshire Marine Special Area of Conservation. Francis often travels with a binocular microscope, which he took as hand luggage to Shetland last year and it caused all sorts of inconvenience going through security and caring for it in general.
The ioLight microscope is small enough to fit in a jacket pocket and displays 1 micron resolution images on the screen of any mobile phone. From the phone images can be shared instantly to colleagues anywhere.
Using the microscope on the beach
Arriving at the beach, it took Francis just 10 minutes to get the microscope out of his rucksack, prepare a sample under a coverslip in a drop of water and view an image on the screen of his mobile phone. We think the images he captured are beautiful.
Pterothamnion plumula
Ceramium Gaditanum
I had the pleasure of meeting Francis in person at the British Phycological Society Annual Meeting in Plymouth in January. He kindly collected some more samples for us to demonstrate on the ioLight stand the following day, expertly sectioned by Prof. Juliet Brodie of the Natural History Museum.
Conclusions
Francis reviewed the ioLight microscope “For use in remote locations and where microscopes and lab facilities are not available, the ioLight is a fantastic development.” he concluded “In my line of work, I can see the ioLight becoming an essential part of my field kit.”
We are very grateful to Francis Bunker for his review, to Juliet Brodie for her time at the BPS meeting and to Amanda Burson for publishing the article in the Phycologist. Members can view Francis’ article in edition 97 in your members area of the website and those who are not members can join for just £10.50 at the British Phycological Society website.
Many thanks to Robert Ratford for posting this beatiful image of a Gipsy Moth antenna on the Amateur Microscopy Facebook Group. Robert tells us that these moths can sense each other’s smells over large distances using these antennae.
Robert is a fantastic advocate for microscopy and a huge source of knowledge and enthusiasm. Ask him about visiting your school or club you will not be disappointed. https://www.facebook.com/robert.ratford.5
https://iolight.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Gypsy-Moth-Antenna-scaled.jpg15002000ioLighthttp://iolight.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/iolight-logo.pngioLight2019-11-08 11:37:162019-12-12 09:02:35Beautiful image of a Gipsy Moth Antenna
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