The UNC SOM Microscopy Services Laboratory (Dept of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine) houses the light sheet microscope responsible for two of the three winning images in the 2024 UNC SOM Art in Science competition which took place during Research Week 2024. Congrats to all of the scientists involved in the work behind these images!
“Ear Steps” (Dr. Ken Hutson, Department of Otolaryngology / Head and Neck Surgery, School of Medicine)
Light sheet microscopic image from a mouse illustrating the cochlea (end organ for hearing) and its constituents, including spiral ganglion cells and their axons that form the auditory nerve, carrying information about sounds to the brain. Also shown are the vestibular ganglion cells which signal the brain about our balance. All ganglion cells are marked by TuJ1 (green), while specific subsets are also marked by antibodies to Calretinin (blue; high spontaneous firing rate) or to EYFP in NF107:Ai32 mice (red; low spontaneous firing rate). Note that as the auditory nerve enters the cochlear nuclear, each fiber bifurcates to terminate in each division of the cochlear nucleus – the first “steps” for analyzing auditory information in the brain. The image was acquired using the light sheet microscope in the UNC Microscopy Services Laboratory.
“Postnatal Duplex Mouse Kidney Neurovasculature” (Pierrre-Emmanuel N’Guetta, Jake Roetcisoender, Dr. Lori O’Brien, Department of Cell Biology and Physiology, School of Medicine)
This image shows a postnatal P0 mouse kidney immunostained for the renal arterial tree with alpha-Smooth Muscle Actin (SMA, magenta) and nerve with Tubullin Beta Class-III (Tubb3, green) overlayed with oil filter. The image depicts a rare urinary tract congenital defect resulting in ureteral duplication (duplicated collecting system). The kidney was imaged with the LaVision Ultramicroscope II LightSheet using an Olympus MVPLAPO 2X/.5 objective at the UNC Microscopy Service Laboratory.