The Electron Microscopy Facility (EMF) at the CIB provides scientific and technical support to research groups applying methods of ultra-structural analysis, immunodetection and cryo-electron microscopy. The EMF offers several techniques in transmission electron microscopy (TEM) focus on two main areas of application, microscopy at the cellular level for the study of tissues and cells, and macromolecular microscopy for the analysis of macromolecular complexes. At the cellular level, the techniques available are: fixation and embedding of biological specimens in epoxy and acrylic resins for analysis by conventional transmission microscopy, ultra-microtome and immunolabelling. At the level of macromolecules, the EMF provides the necessary equipment for sample preparation and their observation in the microscope at both room temperature and liquid nitrogen temperature (cryo-electron microscopy).
The EMF is equipped with the following instruments:
- TALOS L120C transmission electron microscope operated at 120 kV. and equipped with a Ceta-F 16 M digital camera. The TALOS L120C features easy-to-use software as EPU, TOMO and MAPS which allow a high level of automation and complete digital control over the microscope and automatic data acquisiton.
- JEM-1230 transmission electron microscope operated at 120 kV. and equipped with a CMOS TVIPS TemCam-F416 digital camera, 16 mega pixels, and a 16x16 micron of pixel size, placed post-column, which allows data collection at high and medium resolution that can be collected and stored directly in digital format.
- Gatan 910 cryo arms with 3 samples capacity for both microscopes.
- Vitrobot (FEI) for cryo-sample preparation.
- Reichter AFS cryo-substitution system.
- Leica EM UC7 ultrmicrotome.
- Polaron Turbo vaporizer and Glow Discharge device Quorum GloQube dual camera.
TALOS L120C electron microscope was purchased thanks to the following grant:
Project: Crio-microscopio electrónico de transmisión para el estudio de sistemas biológicos.
Convocatoria: AEI - Adquisición de Equipamiento Científico-Técnico 2021
Referencia: EQC2021-006930-P financiado por MCIN/ AEI/ 10.13039/501100011033 y por la Unión Europea "NextGenerationEU"/ "PRTR"
Investigador principal: Ernesto Arias Palomo
Duración: 01/06/2021-31/12/2023
The times for the use of the EMF for non-experts users, those we need the assistance of the technician, is from 9:00 to 17:30, Monday to Thursday and Friday from 9:00 to 14:00. If for any reason a non-expert users needs to use the facility at a different time she/he should contact the EMF.
External users should contact CIB at +34-91.837.31.12. ext. 44 26 93. E-mail: melectronica@cib.csic.es
More Info
High Resolution Cryo-Electron Microscopy Facility
The Cryoelectron Microscopy (CryoEM) Service, a joint effort of the Centro Nacional de Biotecnología (CNB) and the Centro de Investigaciones Biológicas (CIB), is focused on sample preparation and image collection for CryoEM.