Soft X-ray microscopy to image the sub-cellular structures of human stem cells in 3D at a nanometer resolution

Abstract

Quantitative imaging at the nanometer scale is indispensable in life science research. Soft X-ray tomography (SXT) is a technique able to image single eukaryotic cells at their near-native state with a sub-40-nm voxel resolution. By imaging at the ‘water window’, SXT results in quantitative, high-contrast 3D images that gives information about the ultrastructure of cellular components and its chemical composition. Human pluripotent stem cells (hiPSCs) are intensively used in medical sciences in the field of developmental biology, disease modelling and regenerative medicine.