Photothermal Microscopy and
Spectroscopy Webinar

Super-resolution imaging is a critical tool for research, but its need for fluorescent labels presents potential issues because not all molecules can be efficiently labeled. To address these challenges, we developed photothermal relaxation localization microscopy (PEARL), a super-resolution imaging technique relying on the intrinsic molecular absorption. PEARL leverages an ultrasensitive photothermal imaging scheme to capture information below the diffraction limit, extracting from location-dependent temperature modulation of an absorber. Our experimental demonstrations reveal that PEARL enhances the spatial resolution in photothermal imaging of electronic absorption from gold nanoparticles and vibrational absorption of cellular proteins and lipids, which would otherwise be difficult to label. Moreover, PEARL’s compatibility with standard fluorescence or (stimulated) Raman imaging promises multimodal capability for a wide-ranging application in biology and materials science.