2021 News and Events
September 21
Lynn gives a talk ‘3D microrheology using optical tweezers with integrated multiplane microscopy’ at Frontiers in Biophotonics and Bioimaging, part of SPIE PhotonEx in Glasgow, UK, 29th September 2021.
September 21
Welcome to Grace, Maxim and Max who will be joining the lab for their Honours projects.
July 21
Welcome to Carolina who will work over the summer to measure cell shape and stiffness using bio-AFM.
July 21
Congratulations to Josie and Fyntan, our undergraduate project students, on their graduation.
June 21
U-care website goes live. Click here to see it. Exciting PhD and postdoc opportunities will be available.
April 2021
Lynn gives a talk as part of the institute seminar series ‘An optical fibre for trapping and manipulation of single cells’.
April 2021
Lynn gives a talk at OSA’s Biophotonics Congress ‘Optical Manipulation and its Applications’ meeting. If you are registered to attend the meeting you can watch the talk, ‘Machined multi-core fibre tweezers for single cell manipulation’, here. The proceedings paper is here.
April 2021
Our paper ‘Microrheology with an anisotropic optical trap’ is published in Frontiers in Physics.
March 2021
Our paper ‘Optical tweezers with integrated multi-plane microscopy (OpTIMuM): a new tool for 3D microrheology‘ is published in Scientific Reports. This is a key development of technology for our nu-sense project- to allow 3D microrheology measurements to be made.
January 2021
We say goodbye and wish good luck to Dr Andrew Matheson, who moves on to a new job after his terrific contribution to nu-sense.
2020 News and Events
September 2020
Lynn gives a teaching seminar to the institute ‘Flipped classroom in year 1 Physics- How undergraduates will learn this year’.
September 2020
Welcome to Josie and Fyntan who will be completing their Bachelor’s and Master’s project in the Biophotonics group.
March 2020
Lockdown in the UK means that we have shut down the lab. Hope to be back soon.
March 2020
Congratulations to Fyntan and Calum for completing their BSc projects.
February 2020
Grant success! Delighted to be part of this EPSRC funded U-care collaboration to develop deep ultraviolet light therapies.
Our nu-sense project website is now live. Check it out here for updates, outputs and profiles of the researchers.
2019 News and Events
December 2019
Lynn gives a talk to the EPS teaching development group about our use of flipped classroom teaching in year 1 physics at Heriot Watt.
December 2019
We have funding awarded by SULSA for a collaborative project with University of Edinburgh on creating microfluidic devices to improve imaging of bacteria.
December 2019
Lynn gives at talk to science students at Kinross High School about her research.
November 2019
Our paper ‘Femtosecond laser fabrication of silver nanostructures in glass for surface enhanced Raman spectroscopy‘ has been published in Scientific Reports.
November 2019
Lynn gives at talk ‘Shedding New Light on Biology’ to senior science students at Grantown Grammar School, Grantown-on-Spey.
November 2019
We are travelling to University of Nottingham for a ‘nusense’ project meeting.
October 2019
Delighted to host Dr Caroline Muellenbroich, University of Glasgow, who will give the IB3 seminar ‘20,000 leagues under the surface: Novel optogenetic and microscopy techniques for cardiac electrophysiology and neuroscience‘.
September 2019
We welcome Calum and Fyntan to the group to carry out their BSc projects.
September 2019
Lynn is attending SULSA’s ‘Disruptive Technologies in the Life Sciences Conference‘.
September 2019
Delighted to be hosting Dr Tania Mendonca, University of Nottingham, for a week of experiments with Dr Andrew Matheson on multiplane imaging and 3D microrheology.
September 2019
Lynn gives a seminar at the institute Principal Investigator day ‘Integrated optical and microfluidic technologies for cell manipulation and sensing’.
July 2019
Congratulation to Mr Sean Keenan, who has won funding for a Rank Prize Fund vacation studentship in the group. His project over the summer is ‘Probing the mechanical properties of microalgae surroundings at the microscale using optical tweezer microrheology’. He will be setting up an inverted optical tweezer and developing the software to perform optical tweezer microrheology in our lab.
June 2019
Pleased to host Dr Ann Fitzpatrick, Diamond Light source, for a joint IPaQS/IB3 seminar ‘Developing Time-Resolved Experiments at Diamond Light Source‘.
June 2019
We are attending the Photonex Scotland 2019 conference ‘Advances in Photonic Tools and Techniques for Life Sciences‘.
May 2019
We are attending the International Conference on Biophotonics.
March 2019
Congratulations to Fraser, Ross and John for completing their BSc projects in the group and giving their final presentations.
February 2019
Lynn gives a talk ‘A spotlight on Biophotonics’ to the Heriot Watt University Physics Society.
January 2019
We are happy to host Dr Manlio Tassieri, University of Glasgow, for the IB3 seminar. His talk is Microrheology with Optical Tweezers: Peaks & Troughs.
January 2019
Lynn attends the UKRI technology Touching Life network ‘Integrative Biological Imaging Network’.
2018 News and Events
November 2018
Lynn gives a talk to senior science students at Douglas Ewart High School, Dumfries and Galloway.
October 2018
Lynn gives an invited talk ‘Optical manipulation and sensing using machined chips & fibres’ at Biophotonics & Biomedical Microscopy in Coventry.
October 2018
Optical tweezers (Arthur Ashkin) wins half the Nobel prize in physics! The Guardian article quotes Dr Amanda Wright, our collaborator at Nottingham University, and links to Heriot Watt physics.
October 2018
Ross, who worked in the group over the summer presents a poster of his work ‘Surface Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy for Biological Cells’ at the AWE Physics Undergraduate Conference, Aldermaston.
September 2018
Welcome Fraser, John and Ross to the group, where they will carry out their final year BSc research projects.
August 2018
Our paper ‘Single cell isolation using optical tweezers’ is published in Micromachines.
August 2018
Grant success! Heriot Watt University press release about Dr Paul Dalgarno and Dr Lynn Paterson’s new EPSRC/BBSRC/MRC funded project with Dr Amanda Wright (Nottingham University) and Dr Manlio Tassieri (Glasgow University).
August 2018
Lynn presents a paper ‘Controlled optical manipulation of particles within a buried
microfluidic network’ at SPIE Optics and Photonics, Optical Trapping and Optical Manipulation XV, San Diego.
June 2018
Advances in photonic techniques for biomedical sciences, part of Photonex Scotland takes place, with Lynn on the organising committee and Georgia presenting a poster ‘Fabrication of multicore-fibre based tweezers for single cell manipulation’.
June 2018
Congratulations to Dr William Ramsay on his PhD graduation. His thesis is entitled ‘Internalisation of biophotonic techniques; transfection, injection and thermometry’.
April 2018
We exhibited our work at the Heriot Watt family fun day, part of the Edinburgh International Science Festival.
March 2018
Lynn presented a poster ‘Microsphere-assisted optical microscopy for super-resolution white light imaging’ funded by the Carnegie Trust at Dynamic Cell III conference, Manchester.
February 2018
Lynn gave a seminar to the institute ‘Developments in Raman micro-spectroscopy; rapid, sensitive and specific sensing‘.
February 2018
Lynn serves as a judge in the Edinburgh heat of FameLab.
January 2018
Lynn gave an invited talk ‘Optical manipulation- an addition to imaging research capabilities’ at the Edinburgh Super-resolution Consortium 2018 Symposium.
January 2018
2017 News and Events
December 2017 Our research on optical cell sorting is highlighted in the Scientist magazine.
December 2017 Lynn gives an invited talk ‘A biophotonics toolkit for cellular genomics’ at the single cell workshop organised by the MRC-funded Edinburgh Cellular Genomics Consortium (eCGC).
November 17 We exhibit our ‘Optical Tweezers’ research to the Edinburgh public and Lynn gives a lecture ‘Shedding new light on biology’ at the first Institute of Physics Festival of Physics. Lynn, Jack and Georgia are pictured below at the exhibit.
October 2017 Congratulations to William Ramsay for passing his PhD viva!
September 2017 Congratulations to Katie Murphy for winning the best student summer project ‘Surface enhanced Raman Sensors’ in a project supported by the Rank Prize Funds.
September 2017 We welcome our new undergraduate project students; Jack, Ryan and Jack!
September 2017 Our paper to Frontiers in Ultrafast Optics: Biomedical, Scientific, and Industrial Applications XVIII conference, “Laser micromachined SERS substrates in etched fused silica,” has been accepted for Oral presentation at SPIE LASE in January 2018.
August 2017 Georgia delivers her paper ‘Machined multicore optical fibres for on-chip optical manipulation’ at SPIE Optical Trapping and Optical Manipulation XIV conference.
July 2017 Welcome to Jack Hocking who joins the group for the summer to devlop microfluidic devices for rapid islet counting and sizing, supported by funds from IB3 and Scottish National Blood Transfusion Service.
June 2017 Congratulations to Anusha Kelotha and Mark MacKenzie on your PhD graduations!
June 2017 Lynn gives an invited talk ‘Optical manipulation and sensing within femtosecond-laser fabricated devices’ at the ‘Advances in photonic techniques for biomedical sciences’ conference at Photonex Scotland Roadshow ’17 and Georgia presents her poster ‘Novel multicore optical fibres for on-chip optical manipulation’.
May 2017 We welcome Katie Murphy to the group for the summer. She’ll be using laser machining to make Surface enhanced Raman Sensors in a project supported by the Rank Prize Funds.
April 2017 Lynn presents at the OSA Biophotonics Congress: Optics in the Life Sciences Optical Trapping Applications meeting.
January 2017 Grant success! We have been awarded a Carnegie Trust Reseach Incentive Grant to develop an imaging technique that makes use of optical manipulation.
2016 News and Events
November 2016 Lynn and Georgia present their work at Biophotonics North. Click here for the programme.
October 2016 Lynn gives a seminar at the Edinburgh Single Cell Workshop at the Royal Society of Edinburgh.
September 2016 Welcome to our new undergraduate project students; Fiona, Donald and Luke!
September 2016 Congratulations to Mark MacKenzie and Anusha Keloth who have both passed their vivas.
August 2016 The summer is nearly over. Goodbye to Howard and Owen who finish up their projects this month.
August 2016 Welcome to Donald Risbridger who joins us for what’s left of the summer to work on his Carnegie Trust funded project ‘Optical isolation of cells to create pure cultures’. Cedric, Owen and Donald are in the picture below, about to make some isolation devices in the department’s new clean room.
July 2016 Lynn gives a talk at the CDT Intelligent Sensing and Mesurement Symposium in Microfluidics and Optics at the University of Glasgow. Click here to see the programme.
July 2016 Our group’s contribution to the Marine Microbiome conference, Adlerhof, Berlin is highlighted in AquaTT’s press release.
June 2016 Welcome to Owen Anderson, Cedric Pizowicz and Fiona Neufeldt, who join the biophotonics group as summer interns. Owen has recently graduated from Heriot Watt with a Physics BSc, Fiona is a current physics student at Heriot Watt and Cedric is an Engineering student at École d’ingénieurs de l’université de Nantes, France.
June 2016 Lynn gives an invited talk ‘Particle manipulation in femtosecond‐laser‐ inscribed devices; microfluidics and optical forces’ at the 2nd workshop on Progress on Ultrafast Laser Modification of Materials (PLUMM), Neuchatel, Switzerland.
June 2016 Our optical tweezers, transported from Scotland to the microbiology lab at NIOZ, appear in this short film: https://vimeo.com/173342371
June 2016 Research from the biophotonics lab is highlighted in this edition of Lab Times (we are on page 16).
June 2016 Lynn, Georgia and Mark present their research at the Marine Microbiome meeting, Adlerhof, Berlin.
June 2016 Georgia wins first prize for her poster ‘Machined optical fibres for on-chip optical tweezing’ at Heriot Watt’s National Women in Engineering Day. Congratulations Georgia!
June 2016 Georgia and Mark present posters at Photonex Scotland Conference ‘Advances in photonic tools and technologies for the life sciences’; ‘Machined optical fibres for on-chip optical tweezing’ Georgia Anastasiadi and ‘Photoreduction of Silver Nanoparticles in Glass to Create SERS Microfluidics for Enhanced Molecular Sensing’ Mark MacKenzie.
May 2016 Howard (below) joins the group for the summer to work on SERS detection in ultrafast laser inscribed microfluidics as part of his MSc.
May 2016 We are featured in an IOP tweet #iamaphysicist @patersonlynn1
May 2016 Donald Risbridger is awarded a Carnegie Trust Vacation Studentship to work in the group this summer. He will be joining us in July.
April 2016 Georgia presents her work at the SU2P 7th Annual Symposium.
April 2016 Lynn gives a seminar to the institute ‘How to catch a bug (and what to do with it once you’ve caught it)’
February 2016 Our work is presented at Photonics West. ‘Femtosecond laser fabricated integrated chip for manipulation of single cells‘.
2015 News and Events
November 2015 Our work on nanorod tweezing and upconverted luminescence is accepted for publication in Nanoscale. “Determining the 3D orientation of optically trapped upconverting nanorods by in situ single-particle polarized spectroscopy“.
October 2015 Welcome to our new undergraduate project students; Ivan, Owen and Isabella!
September 2015 Welcome to Georgia Anastasiati (pictured below) who joins Lynn and Bill MacPherson for her PhD project to design and make optical tweezers using fibre optics.
September 2015 Lynn, Anusha, Jochen and Mike give talks on their research at the MaCuMBA General Assembly in Reykjavik, Iceland.
August 2015 Lynn organised a workshop, sponsored by UKIERI, on ‘Photonics and microfluidics for the life sciences’. Three of the invited talks were from Heriot Watt University’s Institute of Biological Chemistry, Biophysics and Bioengineering and three were from overseas visitors; Dr Patricia Haro, from Universidad Autonoma de Madrid, Spain, spoke about multifunctional fluorescent nanoparticles for treating and monitoring cancer; Dr Parama Pal from the Robert Bosch Centre for Cyber Physical Systems, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, presented work on an OCT pill for generating high resolution cross sectional images of oesophageal tissue and Dr Manoj Varma from The Centre for Nano Science and Engineering, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore spoke of the diffractive optical interference analyser, a highly sensitive refractometer used for sensing molecular binding and cell motion. Click here for workshop programme
August 2015 Welcome to Ashlesha Bhide (pictured below), who joins us on a UKIERI sponsored collaborative exchange for three months from Dr Manoj Varma’s group at The Centre for Nano Science and Engineering, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore. Ashlesha is working on laser inscription of SERS substrates in microfluidic devices.
July 15 Lynn gave an invited seminar ‘Methods for single cell isolation’ at the ‘Sampling, cultivation and isolation of marine microbes‘ workshop in Texel, Netherlands and carried out practical classes in which marine microbes were isolated using optical tweezers.
July 15 Anusha Keloth presents her paper ‘Single microbial cell manipulation in a three dimensional microfluidic chip’ at PIERS Progress in Electromagnetics Research Symposium, Prague, Czech Republic.
July 15 Welcome to Paloma Rodríguez Sevilla (pictured below) who is joining us from Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Spain, for a month to work on nanoparticle trapping and luminescence.
May 15 Welcome to Pierre-Henri Thiollier (pictured below) who joins us from Universite de Nantes, France, for the summer to work on automated cell isolation using optical tweezers.
April 15 The final programme for the Photonex Scotland Roadshow conference ‘Advances in photonic tools and techniques for the life sciences‘ is online and registration is open. This conference is free to attend.
March 15 Lynn Paterson gives a talk ‘Shedding new light on biology’ to Largs Academy to help the school celebrate International Year of Light 2015 and British Science Week.
February 15 Grant success! The group is awarded funding by the British Council to collaborate with colleagues India on ‘Femtosecond laser-micromachined microfluidics, integrated Surface Enhanced Raman Scattering (SERS) sensors for point of care diagnostics.’
February 15 Work with Mark Hartl’s environmental toxicology group accepted for publication in Environmental Pollution. “Shifts in the metabolic function of a benthic estuarine microbial community following a single pulse exposure to silver nanoparticles“.
February 15 Anusha Keloth and Mark MacKenzie present their papers at SPIE BiOS.
2014 News and Events
December 14 Congratulations to Virginia Ecchario Bravo who has successfully defended her thesis ‘Ecotoxicity of silver nanoparticles on estuarine and coastal bacterial communities’. During her PhD, Virginia made use of photonics tools such as Raman spectroscopy and optical trapping to characterise silver nanoparticles.
December 14 Lynn Paterson presents a current project to the institute: ‘Tailored optical fibre traps for enhanced particle manipulation’.
November 14 Anusha Keloth, Jochen Schuster, Calum Ross (pictured above), Gerard Markx and my lab are featured in this quarter’s Macumba newsletter (see article here).
November 14 Lynn Paterson runs a Royal Society of Edinburgh Masterclass on ‘DNA extraction from strawberries using kitchen chemistry‘ for S1 and S2 school pupils in the university chemistry lab.
September 14 Calum Ross, fifth year MPhys student, joins the group to carry out his final year research project on tweezing and isolation of microbes. Calum is pictured below with Anusha and Jochen.
September 14 Welcome to Dr Mike Winson who joins us on the Macumba project, bringing his expertise in marine microbiology and bioactives.
September 14 Lynn Paterson, Jochen Schuster, Anusha Keloth and Gerard Markx travel to Cadiz, Spain to attend the Macumba project general assembly.
Aug 14 Mark MacKenzies’s abstract ‘Femtosecond pumped biological laser’ is accepted for oral presentation at Bioinspired, Biointegrated, Bioengineered Photonic Devices III, part of SPIE BiOS.
Aug 14 Anusha Keloth’s abstract ‘Three dimensional optofluidic device for isolating marine microbes’ is accepted for oral presentation at Microfluidics, BioMEMS, and Medical Microsystems XIII, part of SPIE BiOS.
Aug 14 The optical tweezers system for microorganism isolation is delivered to NIOZ (Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research) in Yerseke, Nethelands to our Macumba project partners, the group of Prof Lucas Stal, for isolation of microorganisms.
July 14 George Roberts, a MPhys student between 3rd and 4th year at Heriot Watt University, joins us to work on our Royal Society Paul Instrument Fund project developing optical fibre traps.
July 14 The optical tweezers system for microorganism isolation is delivered to NCIMB (National Collection of Industrial, Food and Marine Bacteria) for a ten day trial.
July 14 Anusha Keloth presents her work to the Institute: ‘Isolation and culture of single microorganisms using optical micromanipulation technology’.
June 2014 Lynn Paterson visits Kilgraston School and gives a talk ‘Biophysics- A career in the spotlight’.