A real-time mirror-LAPS mini system for dynamic chemical imaging and cell acidification monitoring

A fully integrated system and user interface, named Mirror-LAPS, was established for chemical imaging of diffusion-based reactions and bioimaging, e.g., cellular metabolism imaging in situ, with advantages of portability, real-time monitoring and flexible control. By means of a field programmable gate array (FPGA), a minimized drive circuit and an illumination path integrated into the hardware, the volume and cost of this Mirror-LAPS system are only 11 % and 75 %, respectively, those of the conventional LAPS system. 2D images can be easily constructed based on the combination of the measured photocurrent with automatic digitization and recorded coordinates for each pixel in the frame. The time to image one pixel under the optimized parameters with a periods per pixel (PPP) of 64 is approximately 6.6 ms. The location, area, and resolution of pixels can be easily, quickly and flexibly adjusted in the user interface to obtain 2D images and a real-time video. The cellular metabolism of HK2 cellsfor different cell numbers and glucose concentrations is virtually demonstrated by this Mirror-LAPS system by the color changes in 2D images for the first time, which could provide a reliable platform in a cell culturing space for cell-based research.