Wide-field nanoscale imaging via near-field speckle illumination by nanoisland substrates

Abstract

Various plasmonic nanostructure-based substrates are used to detect biological signals beyond the diffraction limit with a high signal-to-noise ratio. These approaches take advantage of excitation of localized surface plasmon to acquire high-frequency biological signals while preserving photon energy. Numerous techniques, including focused ion beam, electron-beam lithography, and reactive ion etching, have been used to fabricate plasmonic substrates. However, these fabrication techniques are time and resource-consuming. In contrast, disordered nanostructure-based substrates have attracted interests due to the easy fabrication steps and potential cost savings. Metallic nanoisland substrates, for instance, can be mass-produced using thin film deposition and annealing without lithographic process. In this work, we have investigated nanospeckle illumination microscopy (NanoSIM) using disordered near-field speckle illumination generated by nanoisland substrate. Selectively activated fluorescence wide-field images were obtained by nanospeckle illumination generated on the nanoisland substrate. Super-resolved fluorescence images were reconstructed by an optimization algorithm based on blind structured illumination microscopy. Experimental studies of various biological targets including HeLa cell membranes were performed to demonstrate the performance of NanoSIM. Using NanoSIM, we were able to improve spatial resolution of ganglioside distribution in HeLa cells targeted by CT-B by more than threefold compared to the diffraction-limited images. Note that the accessibility of super-resolution imaging techniques can be enhanced by the nanospeckle illumination of disordered metallic nanoislands. These results may be used in imaging and sensing systems that work with detecting biological signals beyond diffraction limits in various applications. © 2023 SPIE.