Enabling and Realising New Technology Developments 2019

This one day event, sponsored by Reliance Precision Limited, is focused on the delivery of new product innovation through collaboration and partnerships. The presenters will provide insights into new applications for high sensitivity imaging and label-free live cell analysis. There are also presentations on the collaborative journey that led to successful production of a functional prosthetic.

Keynote talks include:

100 Years On: Revisiting microscope lens design for the 3D imaging era

In the mid-80s biomedical science began to depend on chemically-specific fluorescent labels. Unfortunately, a fluorescing whole cell or large tissue sample showed a featureless glow, and the confocal laser-scanning microscope was developed to obtain clear ‘optical sections’. However, the confocal microscope did not work well with large specimens, because the available low-magnification objectives had depths of field of more than 30 um. The Mesolens solves this problem and is arguably the most radically different objective lens in 150 years of development: it provides sub-cellular resolution in hundreds of cubic millimetres of specimen volume.

Applying the Ptychographic Digital Lens: Every cell tells a story

Greater clarity in our observations inevitably leads to a more detailed understanding of the system being investigated.  Using ptychography, a digital quantitative phase imaging (QPI) technique one can investigate large heterogenous cell populations at the single cell level.  As this QPI method is label free it can be applied to sensitive systems such as stem cells and primary cell cultures but also opens up the potential to use multiple fluorescent channels.  Here we will give an overview of the technology, its application and the hardware design that makes the imaging possible.

Grant funded, collaborative development of a compliant prosthetic hand

Steeper currently provides prosthetic and orthotic clinical services to the NHS and the private sector and, since 1921 have manufactured prosthetic limbs and components for worldwide distribution. They were early developers of the simple myo-electrically controlled prosthetic hand, but for many years, wanted to improve form and function and produce a hand with individual digits that could conform to the shape of the item being held. To this end, they were successful in bidding for a Technology Strategy Board grant, which led to collaborative working with external specialist companies. I will give and overview of the development and an evaluation of the grant process.

The event will also include two parallel workshops in the morning: