Strong Demand for Microscopy Education

Recent events at the Core Facility Bioimaging revealed a high demand for a deeper understanding of light microscopy and image analysis on the Martinsried-Großhadern campus and beyond.

Around a hundred participants from more than ten institutions in and around Munich followed both of the two "Fundamentals of Advanced Light Microscopy" days in November, each with two sessions, to hear about the basics of modern microscopy, from refraction and diffraction of light to the principles of confocal, multi-photon and superresolution microscopy. Attendees came from all larger institutions on campus, and some from off-campus. With regard to the many users which newly start using light microscopy every year, we plan to repeat the "Fundamentals" at least once per year.

In December, the four-day STED course at the Core Facility which was organized in cooperation with Leica Microsystems attracted participants from across Europe. Sunny weather on all four days sweetened the intense program with hands-on sessions and lectures. The lectures by Hans van der Voort on deconvolution of microscopic images and by Katrin Willig on STED microscopy in the living mouse brain were publicly announced and both attended by about 70 people.

In mid-November we announced a workshop on the popular image analysis software Fiji for 18 participants to be held on two days in January. Although the e-mail with the announcement went out on a Friday afternoon, within the first 24 hours we got 17 applications. As of today that number increased to 52. Thus this workshop certainly will be repeated soon.

Turnout to the above events underlines the much appreciated desire of many users to better understand their microscopic tools. We at the Core Facility aim to do our share to meet this demand, not only for advanced techniques but also for the basics of microscopy, image processing and analysis.