Technical Developments and Applications of Mid-infrared Photothermal (MIP) Microscopy

In biological systems, infrared spectra provide information on structure, reaction mechanisms, and conformational changes of biomolecules such as nucleic acids, proteins, and lipids. However, conventional infrared imaging approaches lack the spatial, chemical, and temporal resolution to monitor these processes at a subcellular level. Over the past five years, mid-infrared photothermal (MIP) microscopy has rapidly emerged as a powerful, label-free technique to obtain high spatial resolution chemical images. In this session, you will hear the joint efforts from industry and academia ranging from early career researchers to established principal investigators that are applying this new instrumentation to bioanalytical and life sciences. Presentations will focus on the many new MIP microscopy applications that take advantage of the improved spatial resolution, more than an order-of-magnitude higher than conventional FTIR imaging, with the potential to provide new insights into biologically important areas from the single cell to tissue level.