Czech-British cooperation: The University of Warwick has chosen a unique Czech microscope from Telight
30.03.2023 / 21:24 | Aktualizováno: 13.04.2023 / 17:17
The Czech invention caught the attention of British scientists. The Brno-based technology company Telight has won a public tender announced by the University of Warwick, which has chosen its special holographic microscope Q-Phase for its research facility. The device is usually used for the research of live samples, allows very detailed monitoring of the entire life cell cycle and the impacts of various factors, and thus helps to reveal the hitherto hidden specifics of serious diseases.
The device, installed recently at the prestigious British University of Warwick, was developed by experts from the CEITEC research center of the Technical University and Telight, both in the Czech Republic. "Winning the competition is a great success for us. This is the first installation of such a type of equipment in Great Britain and we believe that we will succeed in initiating further interest of British research institutes and academic departments in Czech microscopes as they rightly belong to the absolute world top." explains Petr Jaroš, CEO of Telight.
The Q-Phase microscope, weighing almost 600 kg, has been installed at the university in the maximum possible configuration. It includes 24 well plates that allow us to examine up to 24 samples under different conditions in one experiment. The device has extensive uses, from medicine and pharmacology to various types of biomaterials. It helps with cancer treatment research, studying neurological diseases, stem cells, immunology, and testing alternatives to antibiotics.
Professor Anne Straube focuses on cytoskeletal dynamics at the Centre for Mechanochemical Cell biology and focuses on the structure and functions of microtubules, a hollow tube-like structure found in the cytoplasm (liquid in cells) which help support the shape of a cell or help chromosomes move during cell division.
Another example is a group at Warwick Medical School led by Darius Koester, which focuses on how cells receive mechanical signals through cell membranes and what the effect is on their further development.
Telight's microscopic devices are currently also used at the Jacques Monod Institute and the Pasteur Institute, both in Paris, the Max Planc Institute in Dresden, the pharmaceutical concern Sanofi and the Japanese Konica-Minolta.
Brno – or rather the Czech Republic as a whole – is a true superpower in the development and production of microscopes. The Brno-based companies account for nearly one-third of global production. But first things first. This year marks the seventieth anniversary of the arrival of the first electron microscope in Brno through postwar assistance. German engineer Ernst Ruska came up with the princple of electron microscopy in 1931 and would receive a Nobel Prize for his concepts 55 years (!) later.
Michal Kotek, Microscopy Enthusiast, Telight
Tamara Slate Glässner, Economic Specialist, Embassy of the Czech Republic in London