On December 26, the project, "Development of Core Components and Systems of Super-Resolution Optical Microscopes", succeeded in Suzhou Institute of Biomedical Engineering and Technology (SIBET), Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS).  

China is a large consumer of optical microscopes, but high-end microscopes are basically dependent on imports. Super-resolution optical microscopes and their key components have become a bottleneck restricting the research of frontier biological science in China. 

After five years of research, the scientists from SIBET have broken through the key technologies such as high numerical aperture objective lens, special light source, new nano-fluorescence enhancement reagent, system integration and detection, etc.  

Laser Scanning Confocal Microscope (LSCM), Two Photon Microscope, Stimulated Emission Depletion (STED) Super-Resolution Microscope, Two Photon and Stimulated Emission Depletion (STED) Composite Microscope and other high-end optical microscope machine have been created. 

The four optical microscopes have been applied in Shanghai Institute of Materia Medica and Institute of Zoology, CAS. The Two Photon Microscopes have been sold to the Institute of Neuroscience, CAS, Peking University, the University of Science and Technology of China, and other domestic research institutions, as well as the foreign research institutions in Germany, Japan, Israel, and the United States. 

In addition, through the implementation of this project, SIBET has built a microscopic optical engineering platform, which is expected to provide customized microscope equipment for user needs. 

Researchers are using the self-developed Two-Photon STED microscope to look at the subcellular structure (Image by XIAO Xintong)  

High numerical aperture objective lens (Image by XIAO Xintong)