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High-Resolution Optical Imaging of Individual Live Bacteria
How modern optical microscopy resolves single living bacterial cells and what that reveals about their pathophysiology. Covers the two families of techniques: high-resolution fluorescence methods (confocal and light-sheet optical sectioning, structured illumination, STED, and single-molecule localization) and label-free methods (phase-contrast and DIC, autofluorescence and Raman scattering, quantitative phase imaging and holotomography, and CMOS microelectrode electrical imaging). Explains the trade-offs among spatial resolution, imaging speed, photobleaching, and phototoxicity, and how single-cell imaging enables rapid pathogen identification, antibiotic susceptibility testing within a few division cycles, and studies of bacterial heterogeneity, motility, and biofilm organization.