In situ observation of cellular organelles with a contact x-ray microscope

A contact x-ray microscope coupled with a highly intense laser plasma soft x-ray source has been developed and in situ observations of cellular organelles have been conducted. The soft x-rays were generated by irradiating a high power laser pulse onto a thin-foiled gold target and about 1.3×1015 photons/sr were obtained, which allowed the inner structures of live wet biological cells to be imaged. Single shot flash imaging is a key technique to image cellular organelles of live biological cells avoiding degradation of the spatial resolution of the images resulting from motion blur and radiation damage. The use of a fluorescence microscope to identify cellular organelles in conjunction with the soft x-ray microscope has allowed several cellular organelles to be identified precisely in the soft x-ray images. Combining the fluorescence microscope with the soft x-ray microscope will be very useful and will establish the technique as a powerful tool to analyze living function of biological cells.