Confocal laser scanning microscope

• Subject Area: Basic Research in Biology and Medicine
• Term: Funded in 2019
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 434479391

Confocal laser scanning microscopy is an essential technique to study biological processes at subcellular resolution. Due to recent technical advances, even dynamic and fast processes of organismal development and physiology are now convincingly approachable with this type of microscopy. Currently, the Natural Faculty of Life Sciences I at the Martin Luther University of Halle-Wittenberg lacks a high-performance confocal laser scanning microscope equipped with fast and ultra-sensitive GaAsP detectors to conduct either new or expand current research avenues by its faculty members, primarily within the division of Genetics and Plant Physiology. Existing confocal microscopes are technically outdated and either not upgradeable or have no further capacity to accommodate following time-consuming imaging needs of: (1) RNA granule analysis of adult Caenorhabditis elegans germ cells and asymmetric RNA granule segregation during embryonic germ cell development, (2) bacterial host-pathogen interactions of plant cells, and (3) intracellular transport processes of plant organelles. To ensure a fast and sensitive detection with low background noise, combined with multiple tuneable-laser lines of low energy to reduce photobleaching, the requested system should be equipped with multiple high-end Detectors, allowing for a simultaneous detection of multiple fluorescent probes and DIC, over longer periods of time. To harness the dynamical aspects of our numerous research projects, the system should also be equipped with FRAP, FRET, and FLIM technologies.

• DFG Programme: Major Research Instrumentation
• Major Instrumentation: Konfokales Laser-Scanning-Mikroskop
• Instrumentation Group: 5090 Spezialmikroskope
• Applicant Institution: Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg
• Leader: Professor Dr. Christian R. Eckmann