🔬 VLab4Mic explores this in silico, connecting molecular models with super-resolution experiment design.
#Microscopy #SuperResolution #VLab4Mic @aiopticalbiolab.bsky.social

🔬🔦In our latest Imaging spotlight, Damián Martinez, Bruno Saraiva, @taylashakespeare.bsky.social @mariodelr.bsky.social & @henriqueslab.bsky.social introduce VLab4Mic, an open-source platform that allows researchers to optimise microscopy experiments before performing them.

How do you know if a microscopy experiment can actually resolve a biological structure?
Introducing VLab4Mic, a platform that predicts structural resolvability before you go to the microscope
Led by Damián Martinez and Bruno Saraiva at @henriqueslab.bsky.social
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

🔬🚀 It's out! Run 100s of imaging experiments before touching a microscope. #VLab4Mic reproduces them in silico from PDB/AlphaFold to help you image right first time. From rockstars Damián Martínez & Bruno Saraiva, inaugural preprint of @mariodelr.bsky.social new lab
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

Congratulations to Damián Martinez, Bruno Saraiva, @taylashakespeare.bsky.social, @wmarkbates.bsky.social, Dylan Owen, @christlet.bsky.social and @henriqueslab.bsky.social

We hope VLab4Mic helps researchers design better experiments and ask better biological questions
💻 vlab4mic.henriqueslab.org

🔬🚀 Preprint update for #VLab4Mic - our super-resolution experiments virtual simulation system. Now installs as one-click desktop app: no Python, no setup, thanks to the magic of the @guijacquemet.bsky.social's lab #LabConstrictor packaging engine

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.06.02.729521v2

🔬🚀 Updated #VLab4Mic preprint. Rebuilt the clathrin models from full-length triskelions, dome+flat lattice toy simulations share a common motif. Wanna see how it looks across microscopy methods? (Thank you for the advice @stefvass.bsky.social)

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.06.02.729521v3

Resolution isn't just optics. Structural resolvability also depends on probe size, linkage error, labelling efficiency, steric hindrance and, molecular organisation. VLab4Mic models all of these starting from PDB or AlphaFold structures

🔬🚀 FocalPlane's highlight on our #VLab4Mic =)

Huge thank you to the labs of @christlet.bsky.social, Dylan Owen and @wmarkbates.bsky.social, and to Tayla Shakespeare, who helped us make it happen. #VLab4Mic also heavily uses data from @rcsbpdb.bsky.social, @jonasries.bsky.social and @taraska.bsky.social

Can microscopy distinguish a flat from a domed clathrin lattice?
VLab4Mic predicts:
❌ Confocal
❌ AiryScan
✅ STED
✅ SMLM
A simple example of how simulation can guide modality selection before spending microscope time

Smart microscopy can start before acquisition.

@henriqueslab.bsky.social’s VLab4Mic lets researchers test labels and imaging modalities computationally before going to the microscope.

Better decisions before an experiment can complement adaptive decisions during it.

vlab4mic.henriqueslab.org

Congrats to our researcher Damián Martinez on the preprint release of his project #VLab4Mic, a tool able to virtually predict whether a biological structure will be resolved by a chosen microscopy or labeling before stepping a foot in the lab.🎉

Read and download the tool at: shorturl.at/vnQy1

Feed: "FocalPlane"
Published on Tuesday, July 7, 2026

VLab4Mic: prediction of structural resolvability in super-resolution microscopy https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.06.02.729521v1

This closes a loop we opened with #NanoJSQUIRREL (@superresolusian.bsky.social et al., 2018), which mapped where super-resolution images go wrong relative to a reference. #VLab4Mic comes at it from the other end: predicting what's resolvable from known atomic structure before you even image

VLab4Mic: prediction of structural resolvability in super-resolution microscopy https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.06.02.729521v1