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 Biomedical
and Life Science
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With the existing research tools available in the market
today, it has been tremendously difficult if not virtually
impossible,
to perform nanoscale imaging of single live cells. In particular,
cellular membrane sufaces are transparent to optical
microscopy methods, and too soft to produce any contrast or
even endure probing by conventional AFM method. Scientists
need a non-invasive nanoscale tool that enables the local
probing of live cellular membranes to achieve their research
goals. |
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True Non-Contact AFM is ideal for imaging soft
biological samples because
it provides a method for measuring sample topography
with minimal or no contact between the tip and
the sample surface; Contact and tapping mode AFMs
often induce non-reversible damage on live cell.
Moreover, cells and other biological samples are
often sticky. Tapping or contact mode AFM imaging
will inevitably cause unwanted contacts between
the tip and the sample, leading to contamination
of the tip, and therefore degradation of image
quality with time. |
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Ion Conductance Microscopy (ICM) is the only
non-invasive in-liquid scanning probe technique
that does not apply any force over its sample surface,
making it ideal for nanoscale imaging of soft cellular
membranes.
 With
the courtesy of Prof. D. Anselmetti and his group
at Universitat Bielefeld, Germany
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Live cell dynamics can be observed with ICM since live
cell imaged with ICM over long period of time show no sign
of deterioration.
After obtaining a large-size image, it is easy to zoom in
and monitor local dynamic change of various regions of cell
surface.
Both topography and phase dynamics can be easily obtained
with XE-Bio. |
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For more images, please click here |
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Application
