14 DAY TRIAL // This Monday, February 2, a stunningly complex microscope was unveiled by brainiacs at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia.
The machine, dubbed the FEI Titan Krios cryo-electron microscope, stands an impressive 3 meters (10 feet) tall and tips the scale at about a tonne. Simply put, it's positively ginormous.
Add to this the fact that it can zoom in on molecular structures at mind-bogglingly high resolution and it should not come as a surprise that the research instrument came with a price tag of $5 million (€4.4 million).
Monash University scientists say that they want to use the microscope to gain a better understanding of how the cells that make up the human body interact with each other at a molecular level.
Whatever data they obtain with the help of the FEI Titan Krios cryo-electron microscope is expected to pave the way for the development of better treatments for conditions like cancer, rheumatism and even malaria.
“Understanding our immune system is central to fighting cancer, infectious diseases such as malaria, and auto-immune diseases such as diabetes, rheumatism and multiple sclerosis.”
“The key to understanding and treating these diseases lies in understanding how proteins and cells interact at the molecular level,” Professor James Whisstock said in a statement.
It is understood that this state-of-the-art microscope works by firing high-energy electrons through a sample frozen at minus 200 degrees Celsius (minus 392 degrees Fahrenheit).
By analyzing which electrons are deflected and which are absorbed during this process, the microscope can put together a two-dimensional image of the sample it is analyzing.
Interestingly enough, specialists say that, once several such two-dimensional shapes are obtained, they can be put together to obtain a more complex, three-dimensional one.
