Time Lapse
The ability to observe cell changes over a period offers valuable insight into cell behaviour. The recording of time lapse movies is an important element in the science of live cell microscopy. These movies often show accelerated cellular interactions and reactions which are acquired over hours or even days.
In some cases much faster image acquisition is required over shorter periods that might lead one to choose a mono-chromator light source or high speed mirror based switching system. The CoolLED system is expected to perform better than these systems in both switching speed and intensity.
As discussed on the Improved Cell Viability the CoolLED system offers the ability for greatly improved cell viability. Vibration, speed restrictions and not least of all cost of an excitation filter wheel and shutter can be removed from this set-up as is explained in Dual Staining Live Cell Configurations.
Furthermore, the adverse effects of heat on the microscope body can be reduced by the use of the CoolLED system. As anyone who has had to create a time lapse movie knows focus drift is a very frustrating issue. By the simple fact that the LED source can be switched off between exposures can greatly reduce heating in the lab and of the microscope body. The largely useless and high energy broadband spectrum from a conventional Mercury of metal-halide source - which in many cases gets rejected by blocking filters in the scope turret - has to be absorbed and turned into heat somewhere. This tends to end up heating the scope body. The lack of out-of-band light emitted from the CoolLED system reduces this almost entirely.
Added benefits of power stability and even illumination help in the creation of smooth consistent movies with the highest level of repeatability.
With a CoolLED LED system for Time Lapse, you have....
- Excitation only during image capture
- Stability & Repeatability
- Independent wavelength intensity control
- Fast-switching
- No need for an excitation filter wheel or shutters
- Less heat reduces focus drift
Click here to watch a Time Lapse movie using the CoolLED system as the excitation source.
Movie provided by courtesy of Mike Davidson,
National High Magnetic Field Laboratory, Florida State University.
Example 1: Time Lapse with LED fluorescence excitation for 4 wavelengths
CoolLED pE-2 excitation system with excitation at 365, 470, 550 and 635nm
