Ultimate Speed Limit of Fluorescence and Stimulated Emission Imaging
Event details
| Date | 11.12.2025 |
| Hour | 10:00 › 11:00 |
| Speaker | Andrew E.S. Barentine, Ph.D., Stanford University, CA (USA) |
| Location | Online |
| Category | Conferences - Seminars |
| Event Language | English |
2-DAY BIOE MINI-SYMPOSIUM on Measurement Technologies
(talk five / previous talk / next talk)
Abstract:
Getting light out of fluorophores faster could fundamentally change the role of light microscopy, opening avenues to observe the fastest processes in a living cell, or even determine the position and identity of every protein in a sample. Fluorescence is ultimately speed-limited by its spontaneous nature, but could potentially be replaced by a similar process called stimulated emission. Stimulated emission (SE) is a valuable tool in biological imaging as a quenching mechanism for fluorescence, yet has itself remained relatively unused as an image-forming signal. Often thought of as a light-copying mechanism, SE has potential speed and resolution advantages over fluorescence as an imaging contrast due to it being driven-by and coherent-with an experimentally controlled laser (the probe). The challenge in SE imaging is how to detect the light generated in the sample without also detecting the probe. Unsolved, this problem contaminates SE images with the shot noise and technical noise of the probe laser, which is typically orders of magnitude larger than the SE signal generated by a single organic dye molecule, blocking the possibility of fast, high-sensitivity imaging.
Here, we attempt to detect stimulated emission without the background of a laser. Using fluorescence depletion as a rigorous control and calibration, we test whether the spatial propagation and phase of the emitted light are compatible with practical stimulated emission imaging.
Bio:
Andrew E. S. Barentine is a postdoctoral scholar in the lab of W.E. Moerner at Stanford, where he is developing stimulated emission detection methods. This work builds on his passion for high-throughput light microscopy, a field he explored during his PhD advised by Joerg Bewersdorf at Yale and co-advised by David Baddeley at University of Auckland. Andrew began his research career as an undergraduate assistant in an atomic physics lab at JILA (Cornell & Lewandowski groups at University of Colorado). Originally from the Rocky Mountains of Colorado, it might not surprise you that he has a soft spot for the outdoors and bikes in addition to lasers.
Zoom link for attending remotely, if needed: https://epfl.zoom.us/j/66947851573
(talk five / previous talk / next talk)
Abstract:
Getting light out of fluorophores faster could fundamentally change the role of light microscopy, opening avenues to observe the fastest processes in a living cell, or even determine the position and identity of every protein in a sample. Fluorescence is ultimately speed-limited by its spontaneous nature, but could potentially be replaced by a similar process called stimulated emission. Stimulated emission (SE) is a valuable tool in biological imaging as a quenching mechanism for fluorescence, yet has itself remained relatively unused as an image-forming signal. Often thought of as a light-copying mechanism, SE has potential speed and resolution advantages over fluorescence as an imaging contrast due to it being driven-by and coherent-with an experimentally controlled laser (the probe). The challenge in SE imaging is how to detect the light generated in the sample without also detecting the probe. Unsolved, this problem contaminates SE images with the shot noise and technical noise of the probe laser, which is typically orders of magnitude larger than the SE signal generated by a single organic dye molecule, blocking the possibility of fast, high-sensitivity imaging.
Here, we attempt to detect stimulated emission without the background of a laser. Using fluorescence depletion as a rigorous control and calibration, we test whether the spatial propagation and phase of the emitted light are compatible with practical stimulated emission imaging.
Bio:
Andrew E. S. Barentine is a postdoctoral scholar in the lab of W.E. Moerner at Stanford, where he is developing stimulated emission detection methods. This work builds on his passion for high-throughput light microscopy, a field he explored during his PhD advised by Joerg Bewersdorf at Yale and co-advised by David Baddeley at University of Auckland. Andrew began his research career as an undergraduate assistant in an atomic physics lab at JILA (Cornell & Lewandowski groups at University of Colorado). Originally from the Rocky Mountains of Colorado, it might not surprise you that he has a soft spot for the outdoors and bikes in addition to lasers.
Zoom link for attending remotely, if needed: https://epfl.zoom.us/j/66947851573
Practical information
- Informed public
- Free
Organizer
- Prof. Georg Fantner, Institute of Bioengineering, School of Engineering, EPFL
Contact
- Institute of Bioengineering (IBI), Dietrich REINHARD