descSPIM: an affordable and easy-to-build light-sheet microscope optimized for tissue clearing techniques

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Authors: Kohei Otomo, Takaki Omura, Yuki Nozawa, Steven J. Edwards, Yukihiko Sato, Yuri Saito, Shigehiro Yagishita, Hitoshi Uchida, Yuki Watakabe, Kiyotada Naitou, Rin Yanai, Naruhiko Sahara, Satoshi Takagi, Ryohei Katayama, Yusuke Iwata, Toshiro Shiokawa, Yoku Hayakawa, Kensuke Otsuka, Haruko Watanabe-Takano, Yuka Haneda, Shigetomo Fukuhara, Miku Fujiwara, Takenobu Nii, Chikara Meno, Naoki Takeshita, Kenta Yashiro, Juan Marcelo Rosales Rocabado, Masaru Kaku, Tatsuya Yamada, Yumiko Oishi, Hiroyuki Koike, Yinglan Cheng, Keisuke Sekine, Jun-ichiro Koga, Kaori Sugiyama, Kenichi Kimura, Fuyuki Karube, Hyeree Kim, Ichiro Manabe, Tomomi Nemoto, Kazuki Tainaka, Akinobu Hamada, Hjalmar Brismar, Etsuo A. Susaki
Year: 2024
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-024-49131-1
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Despite widespread adoption of tissue clearing techniques in recent years, poor access to suitable light-sheet fluorescence microscopes remains a major obstacle for biomedical end-users. Here, we present descSPIM (desktop-equipped SPIM for cleared specimens), a low-cost ($20,000–50,000), low-expertise (one-day installation by a non-expert), yet practical do-it-yourself light-sheet microscope as a solution for this bottleneck. Even the most fundamental configuration of descSPIM enables multi-color imaging of whole mouse brains and a cancer cell line-derived xenograft tumor mass for the visualization of neurocircuitry, assessment of drug distribution, and pathological examination by false-colored hematoxylin and eosin staining in a three-dimensional manner. Academically open-sourced (https://github.com/dbsb-juntendo/descSPIM), descSPIM allows routine three-dimensional imaging of cleared samples in minutes. Thus, the dissemination of descSPIM will accelerate biomedical discoveries driven by tissue clearing technologies.

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