Cell Imaging Facility
Web Calendar for Equipment Reservation
Contact Info:
Chris Rodesch
crodesch@cores.utah.edu
Phone: 587-7964
Fax: 585-6364
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The Cell Imaging Facility, a part of the University of Utah Health Science Center's Core Research Facilities Department, has recently been established to provide university and external researchers with state-of-the-art resources for analysis of fluorescent probes in living and fixed samples and for cell microinjection. We house an array of conventional and confocal microscopes and automated cell microinjection systems available for use on an unlimited basis by trained researchers, and workstations are also available for processing, analysis, and editing of still image and video data generated using either facility or external instrumentation.
 
Resources available at the facility are briefly described below. Access any of the many links for more details and/or examples of recent analyses performed at the facility.
1.) Wide-Field Fluorescence Microscopy
- integrated microscope systems coupled with state-of-the-art CCD cameras for high resolution, low noise, 12-bit image acquisition (ideal for applications involving fluorescence quantification)
- programmable for automation of a wide range of hardware- and software-mediated experimental features (microscope control, image processing and analysis operations)
- heated, perfusable stage adaptors for maintenance of live samples on the microscopes
- nearest-neighbor and volume deconvolution algorithms for effective x-y image resolution enhancement
2.) Laser Scanning Confocal Microscopy
- an Olympus Fluoview™ series confocal microscope
- argon and krypton lasers providing excitation energy at 488, 568, and 647 nm
- simultaneous dual channel acquisition
- water immersion objectives (40x and 60x) for use with aqueous samples
- 100x, NA 1.35, oil immersion objective for high resolution imaging


3.) Disk Scanning Confocal Microscopy
- disk scanning confocal head (Yokogawa Electric Corporation, Japan) coupled to either a cooled CCD camera or an intensified, video rate CCD camera
- provides full field of view scaning at high rates (360 Hz) and reduced incident energy levels
- krypton/argon laser providing excitation energy at 488 and 568 nm; switching between lines at rates up to 30 Hz
- ideal for live cell imaging requiring either high frame rates (up to 60 frames per second) or for analysis of photosensitive samples using significantly reduced incident energy levels

4.) Microinjection
- automated Eppendorf® microinjection systems
- optimized for injection reproducibility and cell viability
- microscopes equipped with filter cubes for immediate assessment of injections using fluorescent injection markers

 

In addition to the instrumentation described above, the facility has available a broad array of software for still image and video processing and analysis:

- Openlab™(Improvision; Lexington, MA, USA): used for image acquisition on the wide-field fluorescent microscopes; also a powerful processing and analysis tool; enables masking for simultaneous region of interest measurements on many images; many additional tools, including ratio calculation, deconvolution, rendering, animation, registration correction, etc.; installed on two image acquisition computers and a separate workstation
- Fluoview™ software: used for image acquisition on the Olympus laser scaning confocal microscope; also provides processing and analysis tools, including rendering, tiling, region of interest measurements, etc; installed on the acquisition computer and on a separate workstation
- The Image Processing Toolkit: a large collection of plug-in functions implemented through Adobe Photoshop®; provides a wide array of processing and analysis functions, including processing filters, Euclidean distance map operations, Fourier transform operations, stereology probe application, etc.
- a freeware distribution (Image J, the Java-based version of NIH Image) is available for manipulation of Fluoview images in their native format
- video digitization (from S-VHS and VHS tape) is performed using a miroMotion DC30+ system (Pinnacle Systems) run through Adobe Premiere® (also used for digital video editing)
 

Image Analysis Service/Consultation:
In addition to the resources described above, the facility can also provide quantitative image analysis services or consultation regarding any of the image acquisition, processing, and analysis aspects of a project.
 
Please contact Chris Rodesch (587-7964) for information and to schedule appointments for training or use of the instrumentation.