EPFL researchers develop SPIFFI super-resolution microscopy technique

Researchers have developed a new fluorescence microscopy technique called SPIFFI (spatial polarization-induced fluorescence fluctuation imaging) that allows for super-resolution imaging from a single exposure. Published in the journal Nature, this method addresses a major limitation in cell biology: the difficulty of observing living, moving cells using traditional super-resolution methods, which typically require capturing hundreds or thousands of individual images to reconstruct a single clear frame.

Developed by Wei Guo, Lely Feletti, and Aleksandra Radenovic at the Laboratory of Nanoscale Biology (LBEN) within EPFL, the technique utilizes the physical principle that fluorescent molecules emit polarized light. By splitting this light into four polarization-sensitive channels and comparing the resulting images, the system can extract structural details that were previously invisible. This breakthrough enables high-throughput, multi-dimensional imaging of fast-moving cellular processes in real time, bypassing the temporal constraints of conventional nanometric imaging.