FND Lab

Take a look at this beautiful illustration of the nervous system by the founder of modern neuroscience.

Santiago Ramón y Cajal, who drew this image, shared the 1906 medicine prize with Camillo Golgi despite having very different ideas about the structure of the nervous system. They met only in Stockholm to receive the award. Golgi gave his Nobel Prize lecture first, which was later entirely contradicted by Cajal's Nobel Prize lecture.

Golgi believed that the nervous system was made of a continuous network of filaments, or a 'diffuse neural network'. However, Cajal thought it was made up of billions of separate nerve cells. His work led to the conclusion that the basic units of the nervous system were represented by individual cellular elements, which were later named neurons.

It is Cajal’s idea that formed the modern basic principle of the organisation of the nervous system, in which nerve synapses transfer nerve impulses from one nerve cell to another.

While Golgi’s idea has been proven to be incorrect, Cajal couldn’t have made his discovery without his rival. This is because his co-laureate developed a revolutionary staining technique in the 1870s that made it possible to colour nerve cells using silver nitrate. When Cajal first saw specimens stained using Golgi’s technique he said “I had an opportunity to admire … those famous sections of the brain impregnated by the silver method of the Savant of Pavia.”

Without Golgi’s method, he might not have been able to produce detailed illustrations of brain cells and prove that the nerve cell is the basic unit of the nervous system.

Learn more: https://bit.ly/40Zyabf

Illustration by Santiago Ramón y Cajal, courtesy Instituto Cajal CSIS via Nobel Prize Museum

Congratulation to Greta Paternòfor her work published on Cellular and Molecular Life Science !
In this study, we demonstrate that time-resolved chromatin remodeling during DNA damage can be studied, quantitatively, in live cells labeled with a DNA dye.
Full article here:
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00018-026-06100-9

🔬 Is background limiting the accuracy of your Fluorescence Correlation Spectroscopy measurements?

In our latest paper, we present a quantitative protocol to evaluate and correct background contributions in FCS, addressing a long-standing source of artifacts in particle number estimation.
The approach is applicable to multiple background sources — from autofluorescence and scattering to detector-related noise — and restores accuracy and reproducibility in FCS experiments.
This work was carried out within a broad collaboration including the University of Catania (DFA and DSC), the University of Genoa (DIFI), the Italian Institute of Technology (Nanoscopy and MMS), and Genoa Instruments and colleagues.
Elisa Longo et al:

Correction of Background in Fluorescence Correlation Spectroscopy for Accurate Determination of Particle Number Since the early development of Fluorescence Correlation Spectroscopy (FCS), it has been recognized that background intensity can lead to artifacts in the amplitude of the autocorrelation function (ACF) and, consequently, to inaccurate estimates of particle numbers. Here, we present a protocol for qu...

https://evidentscientific.com/en/insights/visualizing-pine-needles-with-multimodal-imaging?utm_source=&utm_campaign=fy25_emea_ls&utm_content=eblast

Visualizing Pine Needles with Multimodal Imaging: From Brightfield to Fluorescence | Evident Pine needles, often overlooked, reveal a world of structural complexity under multimodal imaging.

Nei giorni 2-3 Dicembre 2025 si è svolto presso il Dipartimento di Fisica e Astronomia "Ettore Majorana" Catania - DFA il "Workshop on advanced methods for the study of Liquid-Liquid Phase Separation dynamics" in cui sono stati discussi i risultati ottenuti nell'ambito del progetto PRIN 2022 PNRR - LLIPS.
Thanks to all the participants!

Quel filo sottile che unisce musica e ricerca. In comune hanno una orchestra e un direttore Salvaguardare i finanziamenti dedicati è importante sia per chi fa studi, sia per chi ne condivide i risultati

Can we detect nanometer spectral shifts in live cells and organoids using the 4 channels of a confocal microscope? Yes!
Recently published on Scientific Reports: "Spectral phasor imaging on a commercial confocal microscope without a spectral detector" In collaboration with the Laboratory of Synthetic and Systems Biology (DSFS, Catania), the Advanced Bioimaging Unit (Institut Pasteur, Montevideo) and the Max Planck Florida Institute for Neuroscience (Jupiter, USA).
Among the first co-authors: Elisa Longo, PhD student in Physics of the Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Catania and Angelita Costantino, Research Fellow of the Department of Drug and Health Sciences, University of Catania.
Check the paper here:
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-025-15637-x
Download software here:
https://github.com/llanzano/4CSpectralPhasor

The FND lab was present at the 12th Weber Symposium with organization, oral presentations and posters! Thanks to Alberto Diaspro and David Jameson all the organizers and all the participants for making this event so special

AIRC for young scientists meeting

Congratulations to Elisa Longo for her work just published on Biophysical Journal!
In this study, we used segmented fluorescence correlation spectroscopy (FCS) to investigate how PARP1 behaves at sites of laser-induced DNA damage. This technique allowed us to directly compare PARP1 mobility in damaged versus undamaged regions in living cells.
Full article here:
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bpj.2025.05.013

Measuring PARP1 mobility at DNA damage sites by segmented fluorescence correlation spectroscopy Segmented fluorescence correlation spectroscopy (FCS) improves the accuracy of FCS measurements in cells by analyzing data in short temporal segments. We have recently demonstrated the possibility of performing segmented FCS using a commercial confocal laser scanning microscope, enabling the measure...