Dear FILM Community,

We are pleased to announce a seminar titled "Overview of the Mesolens Imaging Technology," presented by Professor Gail McConnell. This event will take place on February 12, 2024, at 4 p.m., in the Bessemer 402 and 403 meeting rooms (please note, this is not at RSM). We invite all members to join us for this informative session. The seminar will be hosted by Dr. Christopher J Rowlands.

Abstract: Since the invention of the microscope, optics have been optimized to match the performance of the human eye. However, since the advent of sensitive and advanced photodetectors the human eye is no longer a limitation. This has created exciting possibilities for new instrumentation in biomedical imaging.

We have developed an objective we call the Mesolens that can study large unusually large objects with sub-cellular resolution. The pupil size of the lens is so great that it cannot be used with a conventional microscope frame, so we have built the imaging system around the giant lens. Like the original optical microscope, we have found that the Mesolens has a wide range of applications in biomedical research. I will present an overview of the Mesolens imaging technology, and I will show how we are using it to reveal new information from large biological and clinical specimens.

Speaker Biography: Gail McConnell is Professor of Biophotonics at the Strathclyde Institute of Pharmacy and Biomedical Sciences at the University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, UK. Following a first degree in Laser Physics and Optoelectronics (1998) and PhD in Physics from the University of Strathclyde (2002), she obtained a Personal Research Fellowship from the Royal Society of Edinburgh (2003) and a Research Councils UK Academic Fellowship (2005), securing a readership in 2008 and professorship in 2012. The work in Gail’s multidisciplinary research group involves the design, development and application of linear and nonlinear optical instrumentation and new methods for biomedical imaging, from the nanoscale to the whole organism. She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, a Fellow of the Institute of Physics, and a Fellow of the Royal Microscopical Society, where she is the current Vice Chair of the Light Microscopy Committee.

Best regards,

Volodymyr