Imaging techniques articles from across Nature Portfolio

By exploiting optical phase-modulation at complex surface plasmon polariton patterns, as well as energy-filtered imaging, femtosecond electron pulses are dynamically shaped in phase and amplitude.

An article in Nature presents a conceptually new scanning probe microscope, called a quantum twisting microscope, which enables both momentum-resolved measurements and in situ tuning of the twist angle between 2D materials stacked on top of each other.

Water exchange through the transmembrane channel aquaporin-4 can be measured by conventional dynamic-contrast-enhanced magnetic resonance imaging and is a sensitive biomarker of the proliferation of gliomas and their resistance to chemotherapy.

Twisted monolayer–multilayer graphene superlattices present bi-stable reconstruction states, with reversible switch in-between and long-distance propagation triggered by local mechanical perturbation. This provides additional degrees of freedom for moiré engineering.

The development of time-resolved, multiscale and multi-modal X-ray imaging techniques at advanced light sources raises challenges on the data processing end — but image processing methods from other research areas will help.