Spheroscope: A custom-made miniaturized microscope for tracking tumour spheroids in microfluidic devices

Area of Science:

• Biomedical Engineering
• Optical Microscopy
• Cancer Research

Background:

• 3D tumor spheroids are crucial for high-throughput anticancer drug screening.
• Quantifying spheroid growth typically requires expensive, complex optical microscopy systems.
• There is a need for accessible and portable imaging solutions in cancer research.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and characterize a novel, portable, and low-cost microscope for imaging tumor spheroids.
• To enable efficient monitoring of spheroid formation and growth using advanced imaging techniques.
• To simplify the process of anticancer drug screening through accessible technology.

Main Methods:

• Designed and constructed a miniaturized microscope using affordable, mass-producible components.
• Integrated both fluorescence and phase-gradient contrast imaging modalities.
• Utilized oblique illumination with epi-illumination for simplified system design.
• Validated system performance on synthetic samples and cancer spheroids in microfluidic devices.

Main Results:

• The developed microscope successfully produced both fluorescence and phase-gradient contrast images.
• Characterization on synthetic samples demonstrated system performance.
• Proof-of-principle applications showed effective imaging and monitoring of lung and pancreas cancer spheroid formation and growth.

Conclusions:

• The novel microscope offers a cost-effective and portable solution for spheroid imaging.
• This technology can significantly benefit high-throughput anticancer drug screening and cancer research.
• The system simplifies the monitoring of 3D cell culture models in microfluidic devices.