Researchers in the lab of Sam Peng, the Pfizer Inc. - Gerald Laubach Career Development Assistant Professor of Chemistry at MIT and a core institute member of the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, have developed a groundbreaking super-resolution imaging technology that allows scientists to visualize molecular structures with sub-angstrom-level localization precision — three orders of magnitude beyond the nanometer limits of standard fluorescent dyes — while drastically simplifying the imaging process. Unlike traditional dyes that fade rapidly under illumination and limit data collection, the platform, called U-STORM (Upconversion enabled Stochastic Optical Reconstruction Microscopy) utilizes a new class of compositionally engineered upconverting nanoparticles (UCNPs) that blink spontaneously and indefinitely. This work represents a fundamental shift in both optical……

Unlike conventional multicolor super-resolution imaging, which requires multiple expensive lasers and meticulous optical alignment, U-STORM can operate with just one near-infared laser, which works to simultaneously excite nanoparticles emitting different colors. This results in a drastic reduction of an experiment’s complexity. To obtain images with multiple colors, rather than capturing images sequentially over multiple rounds, U-STORM captures multiple colors simultaneously. Researchers have successfully demonstrate…