Imaging the natural world

Microscopy has long been used as a tool for both scientists and artists to explore the natural world around us. Robert Hooke’s seminal publication Micrographia (published over 350 years ago) demonstrated the fascinating and beautiful structures only visible using a microscope, inspiring many generations to use microscopy in order to understand the biological micro-world. Electron microscopy (EM) offers unparalleled resolution and depth of focus, making it ideal for macro-, micro- and nano-photography. This type of imaging is greyscale, colour typically being a property of light and not available in electron images. Rob Kesseler is renowned for his many colourful EM images of seeds and pollen, with each pixel coloured by hand. Energy dispersive x-ray spectrometry offers an additional way to attribute colour to electron microscopy data and has the advantage that each colour represents a different type of element in the sample, thus providing an extra layer of information in each image.

This webinar discusses microscopy art, how EDS can be used to provide striking and informative images about biological samples and how Rob and Louise have used this technique to explore the topic of air pollution as part of an ongoing collaborative project spanning both art and science.

In this webinar, you will learn how to:

• Recognise how science and art can use electron microscopy to understand biology in a manner that can inform, educate and amaze 
• Appreciate the importance of art and science collaborations to explore the world and engage a variety of different audiences  
• Colour electron micrographs by hand or using x-ray signals
• Understand the application of EDS as an imaging detector for electron microscopy in addition to an analytical tool