Back to the future - 20 years of progress and developments in photonic microscopy and biological imaging

In 2023, the ImaBio consortium (imabio-cnrs.fr), an interdisciplinary life microscopy research group at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, celebrated its 20th anniversary. ImaBio contributes to the biological imaging community through organization of MiFoBio conferences, which are interdisciplinary conferences featuring lectures and hands-on workshops that attract specialists from around the world. MiFoBio conferences provide the community with an opportunity to reflect on the evolution of the field, and the 2023 event offered retrospective talks discussing the past 20 years of topics in microscopy, including imaging of multicellular assemblies, image analysis, quantification of molecular motions and interactions within cells, advancements in fluorescent labels, and laser technology for multiphoton and label-free imaging of thick biological samples. In this Perspective, we compile summaries of these presentations overviewing 20 years of advancements in a specific area of microscopy, each of which concludes with a brief look towards the future. The full presentations are available on the ImaBio YouTube channel (youtube.com/@gdrimabio5724).