In Vivo Imaging Core Facility

The most up-to-date user details are available here.

Purpose

The In Vivo Imaging Core (IVIC) Facility provides a fully equipped environment with trained staff for experiments using 2-photon and ancillary imaging techniques. With four fully equipped 2-photon microscopy systems, and ancillary support for voltage sensitive dyes and intrinsic optical signals, IVIC allows users to perform deep, fast, functional, in vivo imaging with sub-cellular resolution, optionally in regions pre-selected by functional imaging at low magnification. Support for intrinsic, voltage sensitve dye, and laser speckle imaging is available.

Space

More information on facility space and availability can be obtained by contacting ivic@interchange.ubc.ca.

Imaging Equipment

IVIC contains four custom 2-photon microscopes specially designed for in vivo imaging, based on designs currently in use in the labs of Drs. Timothy Murphy and Kerry Delaney. Instead of a standard stage, the microscopes feature a large movable platform with mounts for stabilizing head plates and ample room for experimental equipment. Heating pads and other life support will be available on each setup. The microscopes run custom software which supports synchronizing imaging with experimental apparatus via input and output triggers. Other in vivo imaging modalities including intrinsic optical signaling, voltage sensitive dyes, and laser speckle imaging of blood are available and will be incorporated into the 2-photon microscopes via low power objectives, as well as on separate standalone setups. Fast control of 2-photon laser uncaging of caged compounds using a Pockels cell is under development.

Staff

Facility staff include an optical microscopy technician, a surgical assistant, and a computer programmer. These staff are available to assist with your use of the IVIC facility and for consultation for your projects.

Technology development services

Our expertise in providing solutions for specific data acquisition and analysis tasks can be provided within the context of experiments conducted at IVIC, as well as externally.

Software

IVIC's 2-photon microscopes run custom software written in-house for the data acquisition/analysis/graphing software Igor Pro. Offline analysis can be done with these in-house Igor Pro programs (time series on regions-of-interest in stacks or line scans, projection images of 3D stacks, comparing features across stacks collected at different times, etc) or routines written with ImageJ. We can provide programming to interface with your equipment and automate collection and analysis of of your data.

Hardware

The microscopes at IVIC have been custom-modified for in vivo imaging, with specially designed headholders and skull plates manufactured in the local machine shop. If needed, we can design and have built special mounts/plates to enable your experiments.

For in vivo imaging of evoked responses, it is necessary to provide stimulation of some kind. IVIC has custom built somatosensory stimulators, and can interface your hardware with image collection, or can help you design and build appropriate stimulators.

Users

2-photon microscopy provides fast, high resolution fluorescent imaging at depths greater than 500 microns, with limited sample bleaching. The high resolution and ability to image deep into living tissues facilitates tracking identified cells over time, enabling the study of, for example:

• changes in dendritic architecture during development, sensory deprivation, and stroke;
• cell migration;
• axon growth and regeneration;
• tumor and lymph node dynamics.

A chronic cranial window preparation currently in use allows repeated monitoring of the same neurons for up to 6 weeks. Our surgical assistant is an expert in making these delicate preparations.

The relatively rapid acquisition speed of 2-photon imaging allows studies using pH- and ion-sensitive fluorescent probes to monitor physiology of individually identified cells in organs such as brain and kidney. Vasculature can be filled with fluorescent markers, allowing high resolution study of blood flow. Kidney tubule lumens can be similarly filled.

Members of the UBC community with a research project that would benefit from the scenarios described above can contact ivic@interchange.ubc.ca to get started.

Cost

Please contact ivic@interchange.ubc.ca for costs to use the facility.