How do we use synchrotron accelerators for analysis of cell tissues, minerals, polymer films, geological materials ...

On Friday, March 4 at 11:00 in lecture room P03, Ferenc Borondics and Giovanni Birarda will explain how giant accelerators can be used ... as giant microscopes. We will collaborate with lecturers coming from Soleil, Paris, and Elettra, Trieste, on developing a software for analysis of such experiments. 

Ferenc Borondics (Soleil Synchrotron, Paris, France)

The marriage of LIGO and LHC on a smaller scale - no gravitational waves, no bosons...only hot science

LHC and LIGO are very well known acronyms since the discovery of the Higgs boson and gravitational waves. At the SMIS beamline in SOLEIL we are practically using the same instruments with differences that result in providing experimental capabilities on very different fields. Size of course matters and I will shortly comment on why we couldn't have possibly discovered either of the above mentioned phenomena.

The SMIS spectromicroscopy beamline at the SOLEIL synchrotron delivers high brilliance infrared radiation in the 2.5-100 micrometer spectral range. The beamline is dedicated to microscopic analysis of a variety of samples, spanning from polymer films and multilayers, minerals and other geological materials, biological and biomedical samples, to archaeology. An ensemble of experimental cells are provided and adapted to accommodate various needs allowing experiments at various temperature and pressure conditions, under mechanical stress, etc. Besides working with commercially available equipment adapted to the synchrotron source, the SMIS beamline is a world leading facility in custom built IR instrumentation. In this presentation I will highlight some of the SMIS user activities in the hard sciences through specific examples, upcoming instrumentation developments and collaborations.

Giovanni Birarda (Elettra, Trieste, Italy)

Highlights from SISSI Beamline@Elettra: Live cells measures and Chemical Staining

The Synchrotron Infrared Source for Spectroscopy and Imaging (SISSI) beamline at Elettra extracts the IR and visible components of Synchrotron radiation (SR) for performing spectroscopy, microspectroscopy and imaging. The experiments carried out at SISSI cover a wide range of research fields, including surface and material science, biochemistry, forensics, geology, cell biology, biomedical diagnostics, high-pressures physiscs, conservation science, chemical kinetics etc. In this short seminar two applications of SR IR will be presented.

FTIR for Live Cell imaging and single cell spectroscopy. Ad-hoc designed microfluidic devices are used to perform IR measures on live cells in vitro; IR light is not damaging and allows label free analyses, without perturbing the system. It can be used to probe different biochemical events happening in a cell, naturally or in response to external stimuli.

FTIR for hyperspectral imaging of tissues. Spectra collected from tissue sections can be analyzed with multivariate analysis enabling a virtual chemical staining, that can be used, for example, to evaluate a response to a drug, or to classify different cell phenotype or to discern healthy versus diseased states.