Working on the Leica SPE2: Entry: General entrance AG East 1 st floor, direct right turn to access the Confocal room O.161, knock before entry and apply to the hygiene rules that are supplied. A second person can be present in the room yet distance of 1.5 m should be kept at all times. Exit:…

The CCI is re-opening for microscopy from the 19th of May 2020. We hope everybody is safe at home trying to get a work routine partly at home and for essential work in the lab. Great initiatives to learn microscopy related (and unrelated)  courses are collected here (https://www.rms.org.uk) and on ibiology or MOOCs, this may…

We are grateful to the Veterinary Faculty Utrecht to support an upgrade for the NIKON  A1R system. Many users will benefit from this upgrade since it will vastly improve confocal imaging speeds. The upgrade will be performed  around the last week of May 2019.

The TOKAI HIT heater for lenses on the NIKON system is repaired. Please be careful wrapping the foil around the lenses, the fit should be tight but do not pull the wiring or deform the aluminium foil while wrapping.

Unfortunately, the TOKAI hit lens heater is broken again. We are in contact with the Japanese supplier but it may take some time for it to be repaired (it needs to be sent to Japan). We have imaged live cells without the heater overnight without any problems, yet the temperature at the lens spot will…

The TOKAI hit objective heater is complete again. Be careful when changing objectives when the velcro is around it. The connecting wires can be dislodged from the connectors by these fast movements. Also, the aluminium inner surface is fragile be carefull when you wrap te velcro around an objective.

The objective heater for live cell imaging on the NIKON A1R-STORM system is broken. The thermocouple is being replaced. For short term time lapse (and vibration insensitive imaging) you can use the hair dryer to warm the lower part of the microscope.

The attachment of the different adapters for the TOKAI hit heating chamber on the A1R NIKON / STORM microscope has been changed.  Magnets have been glued onto the MCL-piezo stepper adapter to snap sample holders by pairing magnets. Place a sample holder and carefully put the supplied separate 12 mm diameter plate magnets over the front-left…

The Bio-Imaging Utrecht community organizes an ImageJ/FIJI workshop for experienced users on Tuesday the 4th of April. Previous sessions were very well appreciated and they allow you to interact with experts in IJ coding. You can learn image analyses automation and the experts can help you find, tweak and apply the proper plugin(s) for you specific…

A new 20x Plan Achromat VC objective (air) has arrived and is installed on the NIKON A1R/STORM machine. The multi immersion objective is removed from the turret but will remain available for users (ask CCI staff if you prefer to use it). The new objective is more widely applicable, has a working distance of 1 mm,…