J.T. Donald Lecture: William E. Moerner - Providing 3D for Super-Resolution Microscopy and Single-Particle Tracking in Cells with Single Molecules

Abstract:

Super-resolution microscopy has opened up a new frontier in which biological structures and behavior can be observed in fixed and live cells with resolutions down to 20-40 nm and below. Examples range from protein superstructures in bacteria to bands in axons to details of the shapes of amyloid fibrils, cell surface sugars, and much more. Current methods development research addresses ways to extract more information from each single molecule such as 3D position and orientation, and to assure not only precision, but also accuracy. Low temperature single-molecule imaging can be combined with cryo-electron microscopy, too. Still, it is worth noting that in spite of all the interest in super-resolution microscopy of extended structures, even in the “conventional” single-molecule tracking regime where the motions of individual biomolecules are recorded in cellular environments, much can be learned. Combining super-resolution imaging of a static structure with 3D tracking of other biomolecules provides a powerful view of cellular dynamics.

Bio:

William Esco Moerner (born June 24, 1953) is an American physical chemist and chemical physicist with current work in the biophysics and imaging of single molecules. He is credited with achieving the first optical detection and spectroscopy of a single molecule in condensed phases, along with his postdoc, Lothar Kador. Optical study of single molecules has subsequently become a widely used single-molecule experiment in chemistry, physics and biology. In 2014, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry.