UCL is buying a specialised microscope that can watch living embryos and organoids grow for days without damaging them. This matters because scientists currently struggle to see how cells move, change shape, and organise themselves during development over long periods. Standard microscopes either damage living samples with too much light or cannot capture enough detail across different scales—from molecules to whole organs. The new light-sheet microscope solves this by using a thin sheet of light to illuminate samples gently, while its open-top design allows nutrients to flow in during imaging. It can also image multiple samples at once, letting researchers compare normal and genetically altered embryos in a single experiment. If this works, it will directly improve fundamental understanding of how tissues and organs form—both in health and disease. The microscope has already been used to image human IVF embryos, so the technique could eventually help improve fertility treatments or reveal why development sometimes goes wrong. For now, the primary impact will be on basic developmental biology: researchers will finally be able to watch the entire process of organ formation unfold in real time, at high resolution, without killing the specimen.
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We seek to acquire a state-of-the-art light-sheet fluorescence microscope that combines multi-view and multi-position imaging. This new microscope will address a major gap in our imaging capability by allowing imaging of organs and tissues at low phototoxicity and with high temporal and spatial resolution over long periods -up to several days- of development. Recognising the critical importance of this equipment, UCL is contributing 50% of the total economic cost. Our proposal delivers exceptional value for money and will have an immediate, far-reaching impact on many world-leading research laboratories funded by UKRI and other agencies, at UCL. A major research focus at UCL is the investigation of developmental, morphogenetic and homeostatic processes across scales, from molecular to organ level. These studies utilise various model organisms and examine both normal and pathological conditions. Recent efforts have expanded to include the use of organoids, facilitating research into tissue and organ development and the cell biology underlying these processes. Morphogenesis is a dynamic process that involves patterns of cell movement and shape remodelling alongside cell fate acquisition. These processes can be promoted through remodelling of cell adhesion or polarity; both apical-basal and planar, cytoplasmic re-organisation, intracellular transport, and membrane trafficking. Investigating these pathways and collective cell behaviours requires live-imaging technologies capable of bridging the molecular to organ scales, while also allowing long-term live imaging; tens of hours to days. The Viventis Deep Dual View Light-Sheet Fluorescent microscope provides such capabilities. It is uniquely suited for long-term culture of living samples including embryos and organoids (up to 90 hours for embryoids: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41592-024-02213-w and 40 hours for mouse embryos: https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2023.12.19.572445v2). This is due to its open-top configuration, which supports media exchange even during acquisition. It was recently used for live imaging of human embryos generated through in vitro fertilization (IVF) treatments (https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2024.09.26.614906v1). Moreover, this microscope enables high-throughput imaging through its multilocation capability, which allows for the study of both normal and perturbed conditions in a single experiment. This new equipment will be integrated into the Faculty of Life Science (FLS) Science Technology Platform, specifically in the Centre for Cell and Molecular Dynamics’ Light Microscopy Platform (CCMD), where it will be managed by a team of five expert research technical professionals. This setup will ensure optimum maintenance and user training. The microscope is user-friendly and will serve numerous laboratories (>15) across various UCL departments.
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