[Federal Register Volume 81, Number 171 (Friday, September 2, 2016)]
[Notices]
[Pages 60710-60711]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2016-21114]


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DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES

National Institutes of Health


Government-Owned Inventions; Availability for Licensing

AGENCY: National Institutes of Health, HHS.

ACTION: Notice.

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SUMMARY: The inventions listed below are owned by an agency of the U.S. 
Government and are available for licensing in the U.S. in accordance 
with 35 U.S.C. 209 and 37 CFR part 404 to achieve expeditious 
commercialization of results of federally-funded research and 
development. Foreign patent applications are filed on selected 
inventions to extend market coverage for companies and may also be 
available for licensing.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Licensing information and copies of 
the U.S. patent applications listed below may be obtained by writing to 
the indicated licensing contact at the National Heart, Lung and Blood 
Institute, Office of Technology Transfer and Development, National 
Institutes of Health, 31 Center Drive Room 4A29, MSC2479, Bethesda, MD 
20892-2479; telephone: 301-402-5579. A signed Confidential Disclosure 
Agreement may be required to receive copies of the patent applications.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Technology descriptions follow.

Microscopy Systems for Instant Internal Reflection Fluorescence/
Structured Illumination

    Description of Technology: Structured illumination microscopy (SIM) 
is a method that uses sharply patterned light and post-processing of 
images to enhance image resolution (in its linear form, doubling 
resolution). In traditional SIM, a series of images are acquired with a 
camera and computationally processed to improve resolution. This 
implementation of SIM has also been combined with total internal 
reflection fluorescence (TIRF), but the implementation still requires 
raw images relative to normal TIRF microscopy, thereby slowing 
acquisition 9-fold relative to conventional, diffraction-limited 
imaging. This TIRF/

[[Page 60711]]

SIM system includes a radial aperture block positioned at a plane 
conjugate to the back focal plane of the objective lens, thus allowing 
only high-angle marginal annular light beams from a laser source to 
excite the sample. The radial aperture block can be replaced with a 
digital micromirror device for varying the evanescent wave to allow 
nanometric localization of features in the axial direction. A spatial 
light modulator (SLM) can be used to alter the phase of the excitation 
to optimally induce evanescent, patterned excitation at the sample. 
Various embodiments of the TIRF/SIM system allows for high-speed, 
super-resolution microscopy at very high signal-to-noise (SNR) ratios 
for biological applications within ~200 nm (e.g., the evanescent wave 
decay length) distance of a coverslip surface.
    Potential Commercial Applications:  High speed microscopy.
    Competitive Advantages:  Low cost of manufacture.
    Development Stage:  Prototype.
    Inventors: Hari Shroff (NIBIB), Justin Taraska (NHBLI), John 
Giannini (NIBIB), Yicong Wu (NIBIB), Abhishek Kumar (NIBIB), Min Guo 
(NIBIB).

Publications

1. Christensen RP, et al. Untwisting the Caenorhabditis elegans embryo. 
Elife. 2015 Dec 3;4. [PMID: 26633880]
2. Curd A., et al. Construction of an instant structured illumination 
microscope. Methods. 2015 Oct 15;88:37-47. [PMID: 26210400]

    Intellectual Property: HHS Reference No. E-006-2016/0.
     US Provisional Patent Application No. 62/378,307 filed 23 
Aug 2016.
    Licensing Contact: Michael Shmilovich, Esq, CLP; 301-435-5019; 
[email protected].

    Dated: August 29, 2016.
Michael Shmilovich,
National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute, Office of Technology Transfer 
and Development, National Institutes of Health.
[FR Doc. 2016-21114 Filed 9-1-16; 8:45 am]
 BILLING CODE 4140-01-P