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Science 25 May 2007:
Vol. 316. no. 5828, pp. 1153 - 1158
DOI: 10.1126/science.1137395
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Review

Far-Field Optical Nanoscopy

Stefan W. Hell

In 1873, Ernst Abbe discovered what was to become a well-known paradigm: the inability of a lens-based optical microscope to discern details that are closer together than half of the wavelength of light. However, for its most popular imaging mode, fluorescence microscopy, the diffraction barrier is crumbling. Here, I discuss the physical concepts that have pushed fluorescence microscopy to the nanoscale, once the prerogative of electron and scanning probe microscopes. Initial applications indicate that emergent far-field optical nanoscopy will have a strong impact in the life sciences and in other areas benefiting from nanoscale visualization.

Department of NanoBiophotonics, Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry, 37070 Göttingen, and German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ), High Resolution Optical Microscopy Division, 69120 Heidelberg, Germany.

E-mail: shell{at}gwdg.de

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