Researchers from NIB at Electron Microscopy Spring School
Mojca Janc and Valentina Levak, PhD students at National Institute of Biology (NIB), Ljubljana, attended the Electron Microscopy Spring School in Leeds, UK, between 31st March and 4th April 2025, which was organized by Royal Microscopical Society. They attended the course on transmission electron microscopy in biological sciences, which was mostly held at the Electron Microscopy facility at the Astbury Biostructure Laboratory within the Faculty of Biological Sciences. Apart gaining basic knowledge on physical background of electron microscopy (from mechanical components of microscope, principles of electron optics, to diffraction and image formation), they were learning about different sample preparation workflows commonly used in biology. These ranged from basic negative staining, chemical fixation of tissue and ultramicrotomy to more advanced cryogenic approaches like high pressure freezing, freeze-substitution fixation and cryo-ultramicrotomy. They also learned about single particle analysis following cryogenic electron microscopy, and correlative confocal and cryogenic electron tomography, which are used in cutting-edge research, such as determination of in situ structures of amyloid beta plaques and tau protein filaments in post-mortem brain tissue of patients with dementia. Using the newly obtained knowledge, they aim to implement tomography and correlative light and electron microscopy workflows at room temperature also in their laboratories at NIB to extend the worklows that would exploit full potential of the available equipment (Thermo Fisher’s Talos L120C, and Leica’s Stellaris 5 and Stellaris 8).
The attendance was wunded by Instruct.SI to which they thank for support.
