Institute of Neuroscience, State Key Laboratory of Neuroscience, Center for Excellence in Brain Science and Intelligence Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai, 200031, China; University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100049, China.
Institute of Neuroscience, State Key Laboratory of Neuroscience, Center for Excellence in Brain Science and Intelligence Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai, 200031, China.
J Neurosci Methods. 2021 Mar 15;352:109083. doi: 10.1016/j.jneumeth.2021.109083. Epub 2021 Jan 20.
Recording neural activities over large populations is critical for a better understanding of the functional mechanisms of animal brains. Traditional optical imaging technologies for in vivo neural activity recording are usually limited in throughput and cannot cover a large imaging volume at high speed. Light-field microscopy features a highly parallelized imaging collection mechanism and can simultaneously record optical signals from different depths. Therefore, it can potentially increase the imaging throughput substantially. Furthermore, its unique instantaneous volumetric imaging capability enables the capture of highly dynamic processes, such as recording whole-animal neural activities in freely moving Caenorhabditis elegans and whole-brain neural activity in freely swimming larval zebrafish during prey capture. Here, we summarize the principles of and considerations in the practical implementation of light-field microscopy as currently applied in biological imaging experiments. We also discuss the strategies that light-field microscopy can employ when imaging thick tissues in the presence of scattering and background interference. Finally, we present a few examples of applying light-field microscopy in neuroscientific studies in several important animal models.
记录大群体的神经活动对于更好地理解动物大脑的功能机制至关重要。传统的用于活体神经活动记录的光学成像技术通常在通量方面受到限制，并且不能以高速覆盖大的成像体积。光场显微镜具有高度并行的成像采集机制，可以同时记录来自不同深度的光学信号。因此，它有可能大幅提高成像通量。此外，其独特的瞬时体积成像能力能够捕捉高度动态的过程，例如在自由运动的秀丽隐杆线虫中记录整个动物的神经活动，以及在自由游动的幼虫斑马鱼中记录捕食过程中的全脑神经活动。在这里，我们总结了光场显微镜在目前应用于生物成像实验中的原理和实际实施中的注意事项。我们还讨论了光场显微镜在存在散射和背景干扰的情况下对厚组织成像时可以采用的策略。最后，我们介绍了几个在几个重要动物模型中应用光场显微镜的神经科学研究的例子。
