Research in Action: - University of Calgary

Southern Alberta Cancer Research Institute (SACRI)
Cell Imaging Facility
The mind’s eye has never had so much clarity. At SACRI’s Cell Imaging Facility,
Dr. Dallan Young studies three-dimensional images of cells using “the latest
and greatest on the block.” He’s referring to the laboratory’s $700,000
confocal microscope, a device that easily overcomes the flaws of regular
microscopes and is being used by researchers working toward cures and
new therapies for a wide range of cancers. A confocal microscope has the
unique ability to visually eliminate all of a cell’s material located behind and
in front of the desired slice of the cell, taking pictures at different angles to
produce these highly detailed images. “It gives you a three-dimensional, much
crisper and more precise image of what’s going on in the cell without all the
fuzziness,” says Young, a professor in the University of Calgary’s Faculty of
Medicine. A secondary high-powered microscope supplements the work of the
confocal equipment, which graduate students and cancer researchers use to
get a glimpse of things they could never see before. It’s another valuable tool
on the path to medical progress.
sacri.ucalgary.ca
ucalgary.ca/young/confocal
Microscopy and Imaging Facility
At first glance, it’s hard to tell the difference between all of the complex
microscopes that fill the Microscopy and Imaging Facility in the Health
Sciences building. “The atomic force microscopes are the toys I use the
most,” says Dr. Matthias Amrein, director of the facility, with a laugh. He’s
talking about three microscopes which are so powerful they can scan the
surface of a cell down to about half a nanometre, and hard crystalline
samples even at atomic resolution. The microscopes, together with the
larger suite of transmission and scanning electron microscopes, are being
used to study diseases such as diabetes, multiple sclerosis and cancer,
or to tackle basic questions in immunology to develop more effective
vaccines, to name just one of many examples. Prominent researchers
work side-by-side with graduate students to obtain high-powered threedimensional
images of a cell and its inner workings. Amrein knows the
impact these microscopes have goes far beyond the laboratory. “It’s a
fantastic look at the internal workings of the cell,” he says. “Everybody
here depends on this facility.”
mif.ucalgary.ca/client/
The Cave
The world’s first complete object-oriented computer model of a human
body, a kind of four-dimensional human atlas dubbed the CAVEman, gives
scientists the ability to translate medical and genomic data into 4D
images, and view the graphical representation of this data via the human
form. Right before your eyes in this cube-shaped virtual reality room, the
4D human model floats in space projected from three walls and the floor
below. It allows medical researchers to investigate the genetics of various
diseases and to develop new approaches to targeted treatments. A truly
unique tool, the CAVE can size the data to any scale, says Dr. Christoph
Sensen, director of the Sun Centre of Excellence for Visual Genomics
in the Faculty of Medicine at the U of C. While the CAVE is a continual
work in progress, this is a major breakthrough in medical informatics and
systems biology.
Watch the CAVE live at youtube.com/watch?v=xF_4u-o6yPA
Biomedical Engineering at the U of C: Technology + Facilities
Top: Dr. Dallen Young
Southern Alberta Cancer Research Institute
Bottom: Dr. Matthias Amrein
Microscopy and Imaging Facility
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