Xuanwen Hua, Wenhao Liu, and Shu Jia, “High-resolution Fourier light-field microscopy for volumetric multi-color live-cell imaging,” Optica 8, 614 (2021)

Researchers from the Georgia Institute of Technology and Emory University, extend the performances of Fourier lightfield concept by presenting the high-resolution Fourier light-field microscope (HR-FLM), which allows, among other applications, the fast and volumetric live-cell imaging.

Fourier lightfield microscopes (FLM) have the ability of capturing directly, in a single shot, a collection of orthographic perspective images, all with the same point spread function (PSF). Thus, deconvolution procedures are feasible and easily applicable. The authors of this paper take profit from these facts to go a step further in the limits achievable by of FLM.

To do this, the authors use a microscope objective with the highest NA ever used in FLM. Additionally, the microlens array is set in such a way that the aperture stop is fully covered by only three microlenses. These two facts give rise to perspective images with submicron resolution. Finally, an inverse computational process is implemented to retrieve the volume of the object through a wave-optics based Richardson–Lucy deconvolution of the perspective images and the 3D PSF.

Authors show experiments that confirm that this FLM scheme allows to reconstruct the 3D image of sparse samples using a single camera frame, recovering a volume of 70µm x 10µm x 4µm, with lateral resolution of 0,5µm and axial resolution of 1,5 µm.

To conclude, authors anticipate HR-FLFM to offer a promising paradigm for interrogation of complex intracellular biomolecules, organelles, and microenvironments that underlie diverse spatiotemporal regulations of cellular processes and functions.

Commented by Dr. Manuel Martínez