Quantum dot triexciton imaging with three-dimensional subdiffraction resolution

Lanthanide ion-doped upconversion nanoparticles for low-energy super-resolution applications

Energy-intensive technologies and high-precision research require energy-efficient techniques and materials. Lens-based optical microscopy technology is useful for low-energy applications in the life sciences and other fields of technology, but standard techniques cannot achieve applications at the nanoscale because of light diffraction. Far-field super-resolution techniques have broken beyond the light diffraction limit, enabling 3D applications down to the molecular scale and striving to reduce energy use. Typically targeted super-resolution techniques have achieved high resolution, but the high light intensity needed to outperform competing optical transitions in nanomaterials may result in photo-damage and high energy consumption. Great efforts have been made in the development of nanomaterials to improve the resolution and efficiency of these techniques toward low-energy super-resolution applications. Lanthanide ion-doped upconversion nanoparticles that exhibit multiple long-lived excited energy states and emit upconversion luminescence have enabled the development of targeted super-resolution techniques that need low-intensity light. The use of lanthanide ion-doped upconversion nanoparticles in these techniques for emerging low-energy super-resolution applications will have a significant impact on life sciences and other areas of technology. In this review, we describe the dynamics of lanthanide ion-doped upconversion nanoparticles for super-resolution under low-intensity light and their use in targeted super-resolution techniques. We highlight low-energy super-resolution applications of lanthanide ion-doped upconversion nanoparticles, as well as the related research directions and challenges. Our aim is to analyze targeted super-resolution techniques using lanthanide ion-doped upconversion nanoparticles, emphasizing fundamental mechanisms governing transitions in lanthanide ions to surpass the diffraction limit with low-intensity light, and exploring their implications for low-energy nanoscale applications.

Exploiting Dynamic Nonlinearity in Upconversion Nanoparticles for Super-Resolution Imaging

Single-beam super-resolution microscopy, also known as superlinear microscopy, exploits the nonlinear response of fluorescent probes in confocal microscopy. The technique requires no complex purpose-built system, light field modulation, or beam shaping. Here, we present a strategy to enhance this technique's spatial resolution by modulating excitation intensity during image acquisition. This modulation induces dynamic optical nonlinearity in upconversion nanoparticles (UCNPs), resulting in variations of nonlinear fluorescence response in the obtained images. The higher orders of fluorescence response can be extracted with a proposed weighted finite difference imaging algorithm from raw fluorescence images to generate an image with higher resolution than superlinear microscopy images. We apply this approach to resolve single nanoparticles in a large area, improving the resolution to 132 nm. This work suggests a new scope for the development of dynamic nonlinear fluorescent probes in super-resolution nanoscopy.

Improvement of image resolution by combining enhanced confocal microscopy and quantum dot triexciton imaging

Super‐resolution fluorescence imaging provides critically improved information about the composition, organization, and dynamics of subcellular structures. Quantum dot triexciton imaging (QDTI) has been introduced as an easy‐to‐use sub‐diffraction imaging method that achieves an almost 2‐fold improvement in resolution when used with conventional confocal microscopes. Here, we report an overall 3‐fold increase in lateral and axial resolution compared to conventional confocal microscopes by combining QDTI with state‐of‐the‐art commercial laser scanning microscope systems.

3D sub-diffraction imaging in a conventional confocal configuration by exploiting super-linear emitters

Sub-diffraction microscopy enables bio-imaging with unprecedented clarity. However, most super-resolution methods require complex, costly purpose-built systems, involve image post-processing and struggle with sub-diffraction imaging in 3D. Here, we realize a conceptually different super-resolution approach which circumvents these limitations and enables 3D sub-diffraction imaging on conventional confocal microscopes. We refer to it as super-linear excitation-emission (SEE) microscopy, as it relies on markers with super-linear dependence of the emission on the excitation power. Super-linear markers proposed here are upconversion nanoparticles of NaYF4, doped with 20% Yb and unconventionally high 8% Tm, which are conveniently excited in the near-infrared biological window. We develop a computational framework calculating the 3D resolution for any viable scanning beam shape and excitation-emission probe profile. Imaging of colominic acid-coated upconversion nanoparticles endocytosed by neuronal cells, at resolutions twice better than the diffraction limit both in lateral and axial directions, illustrates the applicability of SEE microscopy for sub-cellular biology.

Instant live-cell super-resolution imaging of cellular structures by nanoinjection of fluorescent probes

Labeling internal structures within living cells with standard fluorescent probes is a challenging problem. Here, we introduce a novel intracellular staining method that enables us to carefully control the labeling process and provides instant access to the inner structures of living cells. Using a hollow glass capillary with a diameter of <100 nm, we deliver functionalized fluorescent probes directly into the cells by (di)electrophoretic forces. The label density can be adjusted and traced directly during the staining process by fluorescence microscopy. We demonstrate the potential of this technique by delivering and imaging a range of commercially available cell-permeable and nonpermeable fluorescent probes to cells.

Simple method for sub-diffraction resolution imaging of cellular structures on standard confocal microscopes by three-photon absorption of quantum dots

This study describes a simple technique that improves a recently developed 3D sub-diffraction imaging method based on three-photon absorption of commercially available quantum dots. The method combines imaging of biological samples via tri-exciton generation in quantum dots with deconvolution and spectral multiplexing, resulting in a novel approach for multi-color imaging of even thick biological samples at a 1.4 to 1.9-fold better spatial resolution. This approach is realized on a conventional confocal microscope equipped with standard continuous-wave lasers. We demonstrate the potential of multi-color tri-exciton imaging of quantum dots combined with deconvolution on viral vesicles in lentivirally transduced cells as well as intermediate filaments in three-dimensional clusters of mouse-derived neural stem cells (neurospheres) and dense microtubuli arrays in myotubes formed by stacks of differentiated C2C12 myoblasts.

Sub-diffraction imaging on standard microscopes through Photobleaching Microscopy with non-linear Processing

Discerning organelles and molecules at nanometer resolution is revolutionizing biological sciences. However, such technology is still limitedly available for many cell biologists. We present here a novel approach using Photobleaching Microscopy with non-linear Processing (PiMP) for sub-diffraction imaging. Bleaching fluorophores both within the single molecule regime and beyond allows visualizing stochastic representations of sub-populations of fluorophores by imaging the same region over time. Our method is based on enhancing probable positions of the fluorophores underlying the images. The random nature of the bleached fluorophores is assessed by calculating the deviation of the local actual bleached fluorescence intensity to the average bleach expectation as given by the overall decay of intensity. Subtracting measured from estimated decay images yields differential images. Non-linear enhancement of maxima in these diffraction limited differential images approximates the positions of the underlying structure. Summing many such processed differential images yields a super-resolution PiMP image. PiMP allows multi-color, three-dimensional sub-diffraction imaging of cells and tissues using common fluorophores and can be implemented on standard widefield or confocal systems.

Molecular strategies to read and write at the nanoscale with far-field optics

Diffraction prevents the focusing of ultraviolet and visible radiations within nanoscaled volumes and, as a result, the imaging and patterning of nanostructures with conventional far-field illumination. Specifically, the irradiation of a fluorescent or photosensitive material with focused light results in the simultaneous excitation of multiple chromophores distributed over a large area, relative to the dimensions of single molecules. It follows that the spatial control of fluorescence and photochemical reactions with molecular precision is impossible with conventional illumination configurations. However, the photochemical and photophysical properties of organic chromophores can be engineered to overcome diffraction in combination with patterned or reiterative illumination. These ingenious strategies offer the opportunity to confine excited chromophores within nanoscaled volumes and, therefore, restrict fluorescence or photochemical reactions within subdiffraction areas. Indeed, information can be "read" in the form of fluorescence and "written" in the form of photochemical products with resolution down to the nanometre level on the basis of these innovative approaches. In fact, these promising far-field optical methods permit the convenient imaging of biological samples and fabrication of miniaturized objects with unprecedented resolution and can have long-term and profound implications in biomedical research and information technology.

Single-molecule Photoswitching and Localization

Within only a few years super-resolution fluorescence imaging based on single-molecule localization and image reconstruction has attracted considerable interest because it offers a comparatively simple way to achieve a substantially improved optical resolution down to ∼20 nm in the image plane. Since super-resolution imaging methods such as photoactivated localization microscopy, fluorescence photoactivation localization microscopy, stochastic optical reconstruction microscopy, and direct stochastic optical reconstruction microscopy rely critically on exact fitting of the centre of mass and the shape of the point-spread-function of isolated emitters unaffected by neighbouring fluorophores, controlled photoswitching or photoactivation of fluorophores is the key parameter for resolution improvement. This review will explain the principles and requirements of single-molecule based localization microscopy, and compare different super-resolution imaging concepts and highlight their strengths and limitations with respect to applications in fixed and living cells with high spatio-temporal resolution.

Achieving increased resolution and more pixels with Superresolution Optical Fluctuation Imaging (SOFI)

Superresolution Optical Fluctuation Imaging (SOFI) as initially demonstrated allows for a resolution enhancement in imaging by a factor of square-root of two. Here, we demonstrate how to increase the resolution of SOFI images by re-weighting the Optical Transfer Function (OTF). Furthermore, we demonstrate how cross-cumulants can be exploited to obtain a fair approximation of the underlying Point-Spread Function. We show a two-fold increase of resolution (over the diffraction limit) of near-infrared quantum dot labeled tubulin-network of 3T3 fibroblasts.

Intrinsically resolution enhancing probes for confocal microscopy

In recent years different implementations of superresolution microscopy based on targeted switching (STED, GSD, and SSIM) have been demonstrated. The key elements to break the diffraction barrier are two distinct molecular states that generate a saturable nonlinear fluorescence response with respect to the excitation intensity. In this paper, we demonstrate that a nonlinearity can even be encoded in fluorescent probes, which then increase the resolution of a standard confocal microscope. This nonlinearity is achieved by an intensity dependent blocking of the resonance energy transfer between a donor and one or more acceptor fluorophores, utilizing radical anion states of the acceptor. In proof-of-principle experiments, we demonstrate a significant resolution increase using probes with different numbers of acceptor fluorophores. Quantitative description by a theoretical model paves the way for the development of fluorescent probes that can more than double the resolution of essentially any confocal microscope in all three dimensions.