Development of an In-Vivo Brillouin Microscope (with application to Protein Aggregation-based Pathologies)

The role and importance of mechanical properties of cells and tissues in cellular function, development and disease has widely been

acknowledged, however standard techniques currently used to assess them exhibit intrinsic limitations (invasive, lack of 3D capability

and of sub-cellular resolution). Recently, Brillouin Microscopy (BM), a type of optical elastography, has emerged as a non-destructive,

label- and contact-free method that can probe the viscoelastic properties of biological samples with diffraction-limited resolution in

3D. This led to increased attention amongst the biological and medical research communities. However, due to the long acquisition

time (hours), this novel technique has been applied only to fixed samples. One important open challenge is to use this approach to

follow the mechano-biological processes in living cells and in real time. Aim of our project is overcome the spectral-imaging

acquisacknowledged, however standard techniques currently used to assess them exhibit intrinsic limitations (invasive, lack of 3D capability and of sub-cellular resolution). Recently, Brillouin Microscopy (BM), a type of optical elastography, has emerged as a non-destructive, label- and contact-free method that can probe the viscoelastic properties of biological samples with diffraction-limited resolution in 3D. This led to increased attention amongst the biological and medical research communities. However, due to the long acquisition time (hours), this novel technique has been applied only to fixed samples. One important open challenge is to use this approach to follow the mechano-biological processes in living cells and in real time. Aim of our project is overcome the spectral-imaging acquisition time limitation by applying the heterodyne detection scheme, allowing the collection of viscoelastic properties in living sample at a sub-second timescale. We will attempt solving specific physio-pathological open problems in biomedicine for the first time.