Brasselet is a CNRS researcher at Institut Fresnel developing polarization- and orientation-resolved fluorescence microscopy, using controlled excitation and detection polarization states to map the 3D orientation and organization of fluorescent probes and biomolecular assemblies (e.g. lipid order, amyloid and cytoskeletal structures) at and beyond the single-molecule level, including recent work on the mathematical foundations of polarimetric microscopy.
Metivier (PPSM) studies photochromic and fluorescent molecules at the single-molecule level - photoswitching kinetics, energy transfer and orientation-resolved imaging - underpinning super-resolution (RESOLFT/STORM-type) probes and molecular sensors. In the broader landscape of NV-centre ensemble quantum sensing (DEER, nano-NMR, T1 relaxometry) operating near pT/sqrt(Hz) sensitivity, this work is paralleled by molecular photoswitches enabling optical super-resolution.
Roberts leads Melbourne's optics group and is a chief investigator in the ARC Centre of Excellence for Transformative Meta-Optical Systems (TMOS). The work is about extracting information that conventional intensity imaging discards: metasurface-encoded point spread functions that recover the full polarisation state or quantitative phase in a single shot, subwavelength structures for edge enhancement and optical computing, and vectorial beam shaping. For a quantum-sensing candidate the relevant hook is that meta-optics is becoming the standard way to miniaturise the optical front end of NV, atomic-vapour and single-molecule sensors, and to add orientational sensitivity to imaging. Positioned against the established body of NV-ensemble quantum sensing work — DEER, nanoscale NMR and T1 relaxometry protocols operating at pT/sqrt(Hz) field sensitivity — her metasurface collection optics and polarisation-resolved detection schemes are being applied to improve photon collection efficiency and orientational discrimination in exactly the NV-ensemble geometries used for pT/sqrt(Hz) magnetometry. Preferred attribute present: orientation-resolved methods that push past standard resolution limits.
Smith runs Melbourne's time-resolved fluorescence facility and specialises in the information channels most people throw away: fluorescence lifetime, anisotropy decay and its orientational content, and single-molecule photophysics, applied to organic semiconductors, energy-transfer systems and biological samples. The group builds its own confocal microspectroscopy instrumentation for time-resolved anisotropy imaging and single-molecule detection. Positioned against the established body of NV-ensemble quantum sensing work — DEER, nanoscale NMR and T1 relaxometry protocols operating at pT/sqrt(Hz) field sensitivity — lifetime- and orientation-resolved fluorescence is the principal orthogonal contrast mechanism to spin-based sensing, and his instrumentation is the natural correlative partner for NV-ensemble DEER/relaxometry experiments at pT/sqrt(Hz) that need an independent optical readout of the same specimen. Preferred attribute present: orientation- and lifetime-resolved methods.