Barbosa de Aguiar develops label-free, chemically-selective coherent Raman (CARS/SRS) and computational microscopy — including compressive-sensing-accelerated Raman microspectroscopy and wavefront-shaping through strongly scattering biological tissue — to push spatial and spectral resolution of label-free biomedical imaging, working within Sylvain Gigan's Complex Media Optics team (Photonics, Information & Complexity axis).
Develops novel optical biomedical imaging technologies (OCT, nonlinear/multiphoton microscopy) for cancer detection, primary-care diagnostics, and neurophotonics, and translates them toward clinical and commercial application.
Develops biophotonics and optical instrumentation for live-cell and cancer imaging, including multiphoton microscopy, image informatics, and quantitative image analysis tools; affiliated with the Morgridge Institute for Research.
Menzel's group develops computational scattered-light imaging methods, principally 3D Polarized Light Imaging (3D-PLI) and coherent Fourier scatterometry, to reconstruct the crossing-fiber architecture of unstained brain tissue at micrometer resolution without labeling. The lab combines birefringence/diattenuation measurements with finite-difference time-domain light-scattering simulations to push orientation resolution of nerve-fiber tracts beyond what diffusion MRI or standard histology can achieve, and is actively recruiting postdocs to extend the technique to new tissue types and label-free contrast mechanisms.
Pantazis directs the Leica Imaging Hub at Imperial and develops advanced live-imaging tools (including novel fluorescent probes and light microscopy methods) to capture the dynamics of embryonic development and disease processes in real time.
Rigneault leads the MOSAIC team at Institut Fresnel, developing label-free nonlinear optical microscopy (CARS/SRS) for chemically-specific imaging of lipids and biomolecules in tissue, and pioneering lensless, hair-thin fiber-bundle endoscopes based on wavefront control for minimally invasive deep-tissue and in vivo biological imaging. He holds 17 patents in optical engineering and molecular spectroscopy for the life sciences.
Sokolov develops femtosecond adaptive spectroscopic techniques for coherent Raman (FAST CARS), broadband stochastic laser fields, and quantum-light probes of molecular coherence for standoff chemical/biological sensing and label-free imaging. In the broader landscape of NV-centre ensemble quantum sensing (DEER, nano-NMR, T1 relaxometry) operating near pT/sqrt(Hz) sensitivity, this work contributes ultrafast coherent-Raman methodology adjacent to spin-based sensing.
Weinstein invented DNA microscopy, in which a specimen's own transcripts participate in a distributed, self-organizing DNA reaction network that is later decoded by sequencing into a spatial map of gene expression, entirely without lenses or optics; he has since extended this to volumetric, whole-organism 3D spatial transcriptomics in intact zebrafish embryos. Where NV-ensemble sensors push magnetic-field spatial resolution optically (DEER/NMR/T1 at pT/sqrt(Hz)), Weinstein's technique achieves spatial resolution of molecular identity through a chemical/sequencing route instead, representing a fundamentally different route to super-resolved spatial biology.
Zhang's lab develops two core optical technologies: spectroscopic single-molecule localization microscopy (sSMLM), which multiplexes emission-spectrum measurement with single-molecule localization to reach ~5 nm spatial resolution, and visible-light optical coherence tomography (vis-OCT), which exploits higher tissue contrast at visible wavelengths for micron-scale retinal and tumor-vasculature imaging in patients. Applications span cancer nanopathology and ophthalmology, including in-vivo human retinal oximetry.