MSC - Microspectroscopy Research Facility
Go to know
In short- Facility for optical spectroscopy and microscopy
- Advanced setups for FLIM, FCS and multiphoton microscopy
- Applicable to proteins, cells, tissues and food samples
- Support with training, methods and data analysis
- Part of Wageningen University & Research
The Microspectroscopy Research Facility is part of Wageningen University & Research and provides access to and assists with optical spectroscopy and microscopy. A wide range of techniques and methods is available to study proteins, cells, living tissues, soft matter and food samples.
What can you do at the Microspectroscopie Research Facility?
The Microspectroscopy Research Facility has ten setups for optical microscopy and spectroscopy. These include both basic confocal microscopes and advanced microscope systems with functionalities such as multiphoton excitation, FLIM, FCS and optical tweezers.
In addition, there is proprietary and open-source equipment available, developed in part by researchers affiliated with the MSC. This includes a super-resolution microscope, a single-molecule microscope and time-resolved fluorescence measurements with a streak camera.
Some of the spectrometers are unique within WUR (such as the CD spectrometer) or equipped for a wide range of applications (such as fluorescence spectroscopy). Some of the equipment was purchased with support from Shared Research Facilities.
Equipment
Basic confocal microscope
The Nikon C2 confocal allows you to make 3D images of e.g. biological, food and soft matter samples.
Multimode confocal microscopy
The Leica SP8-SMD confocal allows you to make 3D confocal images with spectral freedom in both excitation and emission, has sensitive hybrid detectors and comes with FRET, FLIM and FCS functionality.
Multiphoton microscopy
The Leica SP8-DIVE multiphoton allow you to make 3D of e.g. biological or food samples, with improved imaging depth compared to a standard confocal. It comes with FLIM and image deconvolution functionality.
Rescan confocal microscopy
The confocal.nl RCM is an easy-to-operate confocal microscope that has a 1.4x better resolution than a standard confocal.
Confocal FLIM with optical tweezers
The Microtime 200 is a confocal microscope designed for detecting single molecules with high time accuracy, for quantitative FRET, FLIM and FCS. The Bruker/JPK Nanotracker2 optical tweezers allow to perturb samples and measure forces on a micrometer scale.
Confocal Raman Microscopy
The WITEC Alpha 300R+ allows you to record Raman spectra of the compound in the microscopic confocal volume, and includes a scanning stage to map Raman spectra and construct an image of the chemical characteristics of sample.
Super-resolution microscopy
The MiCube is a TIRF based wide field microscope that allows single molecules localization microscopy. Super-resolution images can be obtained by methods like PALM, STORM and PAINT.
Single molecule FRET
The home-built single molecule TIRF microscope detects fluorescence in two channels simultaneously, for the images of single molecule FRET.
Streak camera
The Hamamatsu Streak camera can measure the changes in fluorescence spectra at a picosecond timescale. The set-up has a white light laser source for flexible excitation, and can measure samples in a cuvette and in a rotating cell.
Circular dichroism
The Jasco J815 is a spectropolarimeter that can be used to measure circular dichroism. It can be used to study chiral molecules and protein structure.
Fluorescence spectroscopy
Multiple fluorescence spectrometer are available, including a Edinburgh Instruments FS5 (also lifetimes / TCSPC), Horiba Fluorolog 3-22, and a Cary Fluor.
Who is Microspectroscopy Research Facility for?
The Microspectroscopy Research Facility is located in the Helix building on Wageningen Campus. In addition to students and staff from Wageningen University & Research, researchers from other universities, institutes and industry also use the facilities.
New users
If you wish to use the equipment, please contact Arjen Bader or Jan Willem Borst to discuss which equipment is best suited to your research question. They will also inform you about the current hourly rates for using the equipment. You will receive training to operate the equipment independently, and additional support can be provided on request.
The MSC equipment can be booked via the central Research Equipment Platform (WURREP) of Wageningen University & Research.
Questions about the MSC?
For questions or further information about the Microspectroscopy Research Facility (MSC), please contact:
dr. AN (Arjen) Bader
Operator MSC