Super-Resolution Reconstruction for Two- and Three-Dimensional LA-ICP-MS Bioimaging

Area of Science:

• Analytical Chemistry
• Biophysics
• Materials Science

Background:

• Laser ablation-inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry (LA-ICP-MS) elemental bioimaging resolution is limited by laser spot size, hindering subcellular analysis.
• Current methods struggle to visualize in situ elemental and protein distributions within biological tissues at high resolution.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop a super-resolution reconstruction method for LA-ICP-MS elemental bioimaging.
• To improve the resolution of elemental and protein distribution analysis in biological tissues.
• To enable quantitative measurement of subcellular element distributions.

Main Methods:

• Ablating consecutive layers of biological specimens with offset orthogonal scans.
• Implementing super-resolution reconstruction by combining multiple lower-resolution images.
• Utilizing Gaussian filtering and the Richardson-Lucy total variation algorithm for image processing.

Main Results:

• Achieved a 10× improvement in resolution for quantitative measurement of dystrophin in murine muscle fibers.
• Extended layer-by-layer image reconstruction to three dimensions without image registration.
• Demonstrated superior image clarity and fidelity in both two- and three-dimensional reconstructions.

Conclusions:

• The developed super-resolution reconstruction method significantly enhances LA-ICP-MS elemental bioimaging resolution.
• This technique allows for detailed in situ subcellular elemental and protein distribution analysis.
• Quantitative super-resolution reconstruction offers improved image fidelity for biological tissue analysis.