Mica (Leica): Wide Field/Confocal Fluorescence Microscope with Computational Clearing and Deconvolution

Microscope

Mica unites widefield and confocal imaging in a sample protecting, incubating environment. With the simple push of a button, you have everything you need – all in one place – to supercharge fluorescence imaging workflows and get meaningful scientific results faster.

Select the right modality in real time

Mica unifies transmitted and fluorescence light imaging modalities. You can select from multiple imaging modalities all within one Microhub, including widefield, confocal, THUNDER imaging, LIGHTNING, Z-stacks, time-lapse and more.

This enables you to

  • generate fast overviews with widefield at low magnification
  • gradually zoom in on the regions of interest
  • switch to confocal when and where needed without ever moving the sample to a different system

Video Tutorials

Mica Videos
Mica Videos Tutorials on Youtube
Leica YouTube tutorials
Leica Training tutorials (beta) (password protected, ask us for the password)

Online Help

Mica Help (only available from AMC or CDW)

Achieve physiological-like conditions thoughout your experiments

Live cell experiments require the cells to be in optimal shape. Typically, 2D and 3D cells in media require the temperature and the pH (via CO2) in the environment to be controlled. Stable nutrition and ion concentrations require the evaporation to be minimal. Some experiments even demand the O2 to be mimicked closer to physiological levels. Mica can provide the right conditions in the live cell configuration. 

  • Mica is an incubator: the entire encapsulated inner sample space can be climate controlled (temperature, CO2 and humidity regulation) and offers ideal conditions for short and long-term live cell observation.
  • From dark to light: Mica also enables you to enjoy a brightly lit lab—freeing you from the constraints of sitting in a dark room for hours monitoring your experiment.

Radically simplified workflows

Intelligent automation and AI-supported analysis enables greater efficiency and a faster track to publication. 

  • Reduce over 60% of process steps through system intelligence
  • Reduce time and effort from sample to insight by simplifying your entire workflow
  • Enable 100% reproducibility and repeatability throughout your experiment

Objectives:

  • N PLAN 2.5 x / 0.12  Dry (used for overviews of sample)
  • HC Plan Apo 10 x / 0.40 CS2 Dry
  • HC Plan Apo 20 x / 0.75 CS2 Dry
  • HC PL APO 63 x / 1.20 CS2 Water (motCorr), (Automatic water pump)

Thunder Algorithms

3 dedicated algorithms are available that remove out-of-focus light in real-time, thus providing fast optical sectioning capabilities:

  • Instant Computational Clearing (ICC): Removal of background and out-of-focus light.
  • Small Volume Computational Clearing (SVCC): ICC and deconvolution algorithm for thin samples (e.g. cells, yeast)
  • Large Volume Computational clearing (LVCC): ICC and deconvolution algorithm for thick samples (e.g. tissue sections, embryos, organoids).

The software used is Leica LAS-X