LumaScope™

Etaluma introduces the LumaScope; a dramatically new concept in simple, inexpensive, and accessible fluorescence microscopy.

The LumaScope™ is a low priced, small USB inverted fluorescence microscope. It was conceived and designed by working scientists who realized that a large proportion of the everyday uses of fluorescence microscopy is to check the presence, health, and signal from labeled cells. Traditional inverted scopes are expensive, complicated, and loaded with features that are not required for these tasks. The LumaScope™ focuses on: portability, small size, ease of use, continuous availability, and low price. Perfect when you can do without the cost and complexity of a typical, full-sized fluorescence microscope.

The Pareto principle, or 80/20 rule applies; 20 percent of the features deliver 80 percent of the value. We think we have dramatically simplified fluorescence microscopy and still offer the most useful features. The LumaScope™ was designed to handle routine cell inspection tasks, providing brightfield and single-color fluorescence capability, while being attractively priced.

LumaScope provides the three most important accessibility traits: It is significantly less expensive than other scopes, it is much easier to use, and its size and portability make it available anytime, anywhere.

Applications:

• Cell presence and distribution
• Cell confluence
• General cell health
• Fluorescent protein expression
• Label brightness

More sophisticated uses are also easily achieved with the LumaScope™: cell counting or hemocytometry and growth monitoring. Using the LumaScope™, it is possible to monitor cells remotely through the web from within a tissue culture incubator, overnight, away from the lab.

Features:

• Yields a magnification on familiar laptop displays of approximately 20× with a field of view of 1 mm square.
• Different fluorescence excitation/emission models, beginning with a standard GFP/FITC/A488 filter set
• Brightfield capability included
• USB interface, enabling easy integration with larger systems and remote monitoring
• Small enough to fit on a desk, lab bench, or in an incubator or tissue culture hood (approximately 190 × 125 × 115 mm).

Anticipated Options:

• Long-term incubator monitoring capability
• Simple microplate positioning stage
• More expensive optics or custom-fit objectives with some constraints
• Simple validated reagent kits for common uses

LumaScope™ provides the most important accessibility traits: it is significantly less expensive than other scopes, it is much easier to use, can be accessed remotely, and its size and portability make it available anytime, anywhere.

The current LumaScope™ model is equipped with a standard GFP/FITC/A488 filter set with spectra optimized for measurement of fluorescence from these and similar fluorophores:
GFP (EGFP), FITC (Fluorescein), Alexa Fluor® 488, SuperGlo™ GFP, wild type GFP (non-UV excitation), red-shifted GFP (S65T), BODIPY®, Cy2™, Calcein, MitoTracker® Green, Oregon Green®

Look for LumaScope™ models coming soon with other standard filter sets:

• DAPI/Hoescht
• TRITC/CY3/A555 or 546
• TxRED/RFP/A594
• CY5/mCherry/A647

Alexa Fluor®, BODIPY®, MitoTracker®, and Oregon Green® are registered trademarks of Molecular Probes. SuperGlo™ is a trademark of Qbiogene. Cy2™ is a trademark of BioDx.