Label Free Microtubule Microscopy

The exciting work of Mohammed Mahamdeh and Joe Howard (J.Microsc. https://doi.org/10.1111/jmi.12744) prompted me in the December break from teaching in 2018 to try and reproduce it, using the Nikon TiE inverted epifluorescence microscopy in the lab. With the able presence of a talented Masters student Yash Jawale (now PhD student in the Netherlands), we attempted to uncover its secret levers of light attentuation. After frustrating months, we had a visitor from France, Dr. Kheya Sengupta from CINAM Marseille. As an expert on IRM and RICM (a related method) she helped us achieve it- label free microscopy of the 30 nm wide single MT filaments in (IRM)! And since then we have been toying with it, getting better images with passing days. Now if only the remaining experiments would work!