QuantomiX
WETSEM®
A Technological Breakthrough
- High resolution imaging of fully hydrated samples
- Greatly reduces prep time as well as artifacts
- Capsule and base fits standard SEMs
- Safe and simple to use
- Achieve reliable, reproducible, quantifiable results
Introduction
Electron Microscopy Sciences and QuantomiX have joined forces in North America to market and sell the breakthrough solutions of QuantomiX’s proprietary WETSEM® Technology. WETSEM® enables standard scanning electron microscopes (SEM) to image and analyze wet samples such as cells, tissue biopsies, foods, oils and ink in their native environment.
About WETSEM® Technology
Electron microscopy (EM) is today's primary tool for high-resolution imaging – the cornerstone for research into living organisms and our material environment.
But because EM requires that samples be placed in a vacuum, it has not been suitable for examining wet samples. This single drawback has been a major impediment to the use of EM for biomedical research, as well as for many other clinical and industrial applications. Until now, the only means of imaging a wet sample with EM was to freeze or dry it, effectively changing it's nature in the process. Such sample preparation is also time-consuming, costly, and often introduces artifacts.
QuantomiX WETSEM® – developed with the cooperation of some of the world's leading life sciences and materials science researchers and labs – dramatically reduces the preparation needs for high-resolution imaging of wet samples, making imaging easier and faster. It also eliminates many of the artifacts that result when preparing wet samples for EM, opening up opportunities for new research methods as well as new processing methodologies in a variety of fields.
WETSEM® also uniquely enables imaging of samples that contain oily and volatile materials.
Also for the first time, WETSEM® enables microanalysis using energy dispersive spectrometry (EDS) of wet samples in their native state, a long-awaited capability for many industrial and research labs.
Concept
View Hydration Movies
Development of Ca(OH)2 in the In-situ hydration of Portland Cement
WETSEM® Technology is based on a proprietary capsule that is placed on the specimen stage of a standard SEM. At the heart of the capsule is a patented, nanotech-engineered transparent membrane that completely isolates a wet sample from the powerful vaccuum used in SEM chambers.
The capsule serves the combined function of specimen holder or cell culture dish, depending on the application. This unique receptacle permits electrons to enter and exit the capsule, while maintaining the sample in its natural state at atmospheric pressure.
Imaging is achieved either with backscattered (BSE) electron detection or X-ray detection, revealing high-resolution structure as well as material composition.
WETSEM® is ideally suited for fully-hydrated or liquid-containing samples – including foods, oils, cosmetics, ink, biological cells, tissues, and fluid suspensions. In certain settings, WETSEM® also enables imaging of dynamic reactions and their products.
Applications
- Industrial research: food, oils, dyes, emulsions, pharmaceuticals, suspensions, personal care goods, cosmetics, inks.
- Quality control and quality assurance.
- Life sciences and medicine: cultured and primary cells, histology,nerve cells and myelin imaging, microbiology, plants.
- Tissue implants and prostheses.
- Environmental and toxicological applications.
- Clinical diagnosis: histopathology, cytology, oncology.
Features
- Analyze size distribution, aggregation and homogeneity of particle suspensions.
- Perform EDS of fully hydrated samples.
- SEM imaging of oils, greases, volatile substances, emulsions and creams.
- Enables tissue morphology and analysis.
- Characterize cellular and subcellular organelles, cell contacts and receptors, cytoskeleton and other detail.
- Characterize and quantify lipids in fully-wet cells and tissues.
More Information
Product Listings
WETSEM® Applications
WETSEM® Gallery
FAQ
Publications
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