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Updated: Dec 4, 2025
Single Plane Illumination Module and Micro-capillary Approach for a Wide-field Microscope
Published on: August 15, 2014
High-speed axially swept light sheet microscopy using a linear MEMS phased array for isotropic resolution
Joseph Landry1, Stephen Hamann1, Olav Solgaard1
1Stanford University, Edward L. Ginzton Laboratory, Stanford, California, United States.
Significance:
Axially swept light sheet microscopy is used for deconvolution-free, high-resolution 3D imaging, but usually the axial scan mechanism reduces the top imaging speed. Phased arrays (PAs) for axial scanning enable both high resolution and high speed.
Aim:
A high-speed PA with an update rate faster than the camera row read time is used to track the rolling shutter at camera-limited rates.
Approach:
The point spread function is evaluated to ensure sub-micron isotropic resolution, and the technique is demonstrated on a live Drosophila embryo.
Results:
Isotropic resolution is shown down to 720 ± 55 nm in all three spatial dimensions. With an update rate of 2.85 μs, the PA tracks the camera sensor rolling shutter at camera-limited rates. Features in the Drosophila embryo are resolved clearly compared with the equivalent static light sheet case. The random-access nature of the PA enables a camera sensor readout in the same direction for each frame to maintain even temporal sampling in image sequences with no speed loss.
Conclusions:
Use of PAs is compatible with axially swept light sheet microscopy and offers significant improvements in speed.
