Learning – The Live Cell Imaging facility

Registrations to the LCI microscopy course 2025 will soon close!

There are a few spots left at our course (27 Jan – 14 Feb 2025): ‘Microscopy: improve your imaging skills – from sample preparation to image analysis’ (6 credits). Application deadline: 5th of November 2024.

This course is completely unique in that it is a highly hands-on course but because it runs completely remotely, your hands will be on your own microscope and your own sample. 😊

To see how the course can help your microscopy project, check out the course schedule 2025 and the alumni testimonies on the course webpage.
You can read the course syllabus and apply on this page. Make sure you check the eligibility criteria and click on the + sign at the top for more information.
If you cannot apply to the course, you can anyway follow any of the lectures (in blue on the course schedule) as they will be publicly broadcasted live on Zoom and accessible to anyone without registration. The schedule and zoom link are available on the course page.

The purpose of the LCI facility microscopy course is to provide PhD students, researchers and core facility staff who have some prior experience of microscopy with enough theoretical and practical knowledge about their OWN sample and their OWN microscope, to enable them to:

assess and improve their sample so that it becomes suitable for data extraction from fluorescence images,
make best use of the hardware available in their lab/facility,
fully understand the acquisition parameters they need to set in their own microscope software,
design their experiment from scientific question to image analysis using a strong knowledge base.

The aim is to provide you with tools to acquire on ANY wide field, confocal or light sheet microscope, images of your samples that reliably answer your scientific question.

The course is free of charge. Contact us (LiveCellImaging@ki.se) for enquiries.

Gisele is hiring!

At the LCI, we have a long standing collaboration with Gisele Miranda, a great and kind image analyst affiliated to BIIF. Gisele is now starting her own image analysis lab! She is currently hiring 2 PhD students so if you know anyone interested, please spread the word. Here is what Gisele says:

I am excited to share that I have recently started my own research group as a SciLifeLab Fellow at KTH Royal Institute of Technology and the Science for Life Laboratory in Stockholm, Sweden. My group will focus on developing and applying cutting-edge Machine Learning techniques to deepen our understanding of cellular behavior and interactions. With a strong emphasis on generative AI, we aim to explore diverse data types, such as microscopy images and omics data, to simulate and predict biological behavior. Our work will focus on mapping complex relationships between single-cell and spatial features, driving new insights into the underlying architecture of cellular networks.

As part of building my group, I currently have two open PhD positions. I would deeply appreciate your help in spreading the word about these opportunities to potential candidates who are interested in working at the intersection of AI and biology.

https://www.kth.se/lediga-jobb/751352?l=en

https://www.kth.se/lediga-jobb/758900?l=en

Thank you for your support, and I look forward to staying connected as my group takes shape!

Best regards,
Gisele

Open house at the LCI facility on 24th of September

Dear microscopy enthusiasts,

The Live Cell Imaging core facility is happy to invite you to a microscopy event on Tuesday, 24th of September.

You will have the opportunity to see Nikon ECLIPSE Ji Smart microscope in action!!!! A fast and easy to work with benchtop microscope with many ready to run experimental assays, AI powered automated imaging and instant image analysis!!!!

We are also showing the power of our CrEST V3DeepSIM super-resolution microscope, that offers double the resolution of a confocal microscope (down to aprox. 100 nm resolution in xy; 300 nm in z), even in thick samples. Flexible and can be used with any objectives, even low magnification air objectives!!!!

Do you want to image large, cleared samples? No problem, come to our demo and see our fast imaging light sheet microscope from M Squared in action!

Program

9:30-12.15 Open house: Come and ask questions about microscopes at our facility! Drop in.

9.30-10.00 Public demonstration of CrEST V3 spinning disk microscope

10.00-10.45 Public demonstration of the Nikon ECLIPSE Ji Smart Imaging microscope

10.45-11.00 Coffee

11.00-11.45 Public demonstration of the CrEST V3 DeepSIM super-resolution microscope

11.45- 12.15 Public demonstration of the Light sheet microscope from M Squared

13.00- 17.00 Private demonstration (bring your own sample) on ECLIPSE Ji and CrEST V3 DeepSIM

Registration is mandatory for private demonstration. Register by sending an email to gabriela.imreh@ki.se latest on 23^rd of Sept. Mention which instrument you would like to have the private demonstration on.

Venue: Flemingsberg Campus Neo, Karolinska Institute, Blickagången 16, Floor 7.

Please call us so we can let you in. (Gabriela Imreh 0707480761; Sylvie Le Guyader: 0737335008; Jianjang Hu: 0729087375)

Please share this event with friends and colleagues who may also be interested in attending this event.

Free online Microtutor course about fluorescence microscopy

Dear everyone

Microtutor Live will soon start its first flipped classroom version of its online Fluorescence microscopy course. I am happy to be one of the instructors for Europe! See below more info and how to apply! 🙂

Fluorescence Microscopy is a common technique in biological research, yet few researchers receive formal training on how to use it effectively. Microtutor, an interactive and free educational website, addresses this gap by offering self-guided courses on microscopy fundamentals. Students enroll themselves and work through the course at their own pace. Since the release of the first course on fluorescence microscopy in June, >600 students from all over the world have enrolled.

This fall, there is now going to be a special Microtutor LIVE version of the fluorescence microscopy course that includes instructor support instructor support. In this version, the students are assigned virtual course content each week to go through on their own, and then meet weekly with instructors over Zoom for Q&A. They can also attend virtual guest lectures each week, which will cover applications of the content. At the end, students can submit an optional individual project in the form of a microscopy experiment proposal to receive a certificate of completion for the course.

Students can learn more information and apply to join here.

The LCI core facility is now a member of Eurobioimaging!

Good news! The LCI facility is now part of the Swedish Eurobioimaging node! 🙂

This means that you can apply for funds to come and get trained, do some job shadowing or image at the LCI core facility!

The Swedish Eurobioimaging node is even partner in special European funding programs for Agroecology, and Cancer research.

We are looking forward to welcoming you to our facility! 🙂

Best practice to prepare figures with microscopy images

Here you can find information about a very interesting talk on the 5th of March (7pm, Swedish time) about the recommended practice to prepare figures containing microscopy images.

This talk is based on a recent Nature communications article Community-developed checklists for publishing images and image analysis.

The LCI open microscopy course starts on Monday! :)

Dear all

It is my pleasure to invite you to follow the LCI facility microscopy course Microscopy: improve your imaging skills – from sample preparation to image analysis.

The course starts next Monday (29 Jan) and runs until the 16^th of February.

As usual, all the course lectures are broadcasted live on Zoom. It is free of charge and you do not need to register.

The aim for this course is to improve the microscopy skills of students and researchers who have already used a microscope to acquire digital images of fluorescent samples but feel that more knowledge could help them.

Here is a selection of what we will talk about:

Optics and image formation,
Anatomy of a microscope
Objectives and refraction index
Cameras and detectors, Noise and background, Bit depth and saturation
Sample preparation, Immunostaining, Clearing and expansion
Resolution and contrast, Nyquist sampling, Microscope settings
Data handling, OMERO.figure, Requirements for image analysis, Colocalization
Image processing and analysis

Check our course webpage to see the course schedule (Broadcasted activities are in blue) and the Zoom link. Scroll down to read the kind testimonies of our dear students! 🙂

Here is the course syllabus.

For those who are on a far away time zome, we record all the live lectures and post them every evening on the LCI facility YouTube channel! 🙂

We hope that you will enjoy the LCI facility microscopy course!

Kindly forward to anyone who might be interested.

The LCI team

A few spots left at the LCI microscopy course 29/01-16/02 2024

There are a few spots left for the LCI core facility light microscopy course (29 Jan – 17 Feb 2024): ‘Microscopy: improve your imaging skills – from sample preparation to image analysis’ (6 credits).

This course is completely unique in that it is a highly hands-on, but your hands will be on your own microscope and own sample. The course runs completely remotely! 😊

To see how the course can help your microscopy project, check the course webpage. Look at the course schedule 2024 and the alumni testimonies!
Also check the course syllabus to see the eligibility criteria. Also read what you will learn in the Course content and Intended Learning Outcomes sections.
If you cannot apply to the course, you can anyway follow any of the lectures (in blue on the schedule) as they will be publicly broadcasted live on Zoom and accessible to anyone without registration. The schedule and zoom link are available on the course page.

1) assess and improve their sample so that it becomes suitable for data extraction from fluorescence images,

2) make best use of the hardware available in their lab/facility,

3) fully understand the acquisition parameters they need to set in their own microscope software,

4) design their experiment from scientific question to image analysis using a strong knowledge base.

The aim is to provide you with tools to acquire on ANY wide field, confocal or light sheet microscope, images of your samples that reliably answer your scientific question.

The course is free of charge. Contact us (LiveCellImaging@ki.se) for enquiries.

Spatial transcriptomics in Flemingsberg!

Spatial transcriptomics techniques are booming! It is now possible to identify where RNAs are located within a tissue! At the LCI facility, we routinely image samples labelled with RNAscope. If you use RNAscope, you might be interested in this workshop where you will learn how to label thick samples with RNAscope, and this symposium about automated RNAscope.

Additionally, we can now offer the 10x Genomics Visium technology on the South Campus, as a collaboration between 4 core facilities in Flemingsberg: LCI, FENO, SICOF and BEA core facilities!

Here is the workflow:

We discuss your project and advise you for the preparation of your sample.
You cut your sample and optimize the antibody or H/E staining yourself, under the guidance if the LCI staff to best preserve the RNAs.
You image your tissue sections at the LCI facility.
You transfer your section to SICOF who tags the RNAs and amplifies the library, using the 10x Genomics Visium technology.
The library goes to BEA for sequencing.

Section size: max 6.5×6.5 mm or max 11×11 mm
Human or mouse
Paraffin-embedded or fresh-frozen
Labelled with H/E or fluorescent antibodies

Come and talk to us about your Spatial Transcriptomics project!

Time to register to the LCI microscopy course!

Dear all

It is time to enroll to the yearly light microscopy course run by the Live Cell imaging core facility (29 Jan – 17 Feb 2024): ‘Microscopy: improve your imaging skills – from sample preparation to image analysis’ (6 credits).

Check the course schedule 2024 and the syllabus to see the course content and alumni testimonies.
Postdocs or registered PhD students can apply to the course.
Please read carefully the eligibility criteria in the syllabus and note that the last registration date is the 15^th of November.
If you cannot apply to the course, you can anyway follow any of the lectures (in blue on the schedule) as they will be publicly broadcasted live on Zoom and accessible to anyone without registration. The schedule and zoom link are on the course page.

The purpose of this course is to enable PhD students and researchers who have already and recently used a microscope to acquire images of fluorescent samples, to improve their microscopy skills.

The course is NOT aimed at training people to use the LCI facility microscopes. The focus is instead on providing the students with enough theoretical and practical knowledge about their OWN sample and their OWN microscope, to enable them to:

1) prepare their sample and formulate their scientific question in a way that is suitable for data extraction from fluorescence images

2) properly use the hardware available in their lab/facility and 3) fully understand each parameter they need to set in the software in their lab/facility.

The aim is to provide the course students with the tools to acquire on ANY wide field, confocal or light sheet microscope, images of their samples that reliably answer their scientific question.

Please help us spread the word. 😃