A high-pressure cell for optical microscopy and measurements on the phase diagram of poly(diethylsiloxane)

Abstract

A new high-pressure cell as useful equipment for a polarizing microscope is described. Measurements in a temperature range between −40 and +270 °C under hydrostatic pressures up to 300 MPa allow for example the observation of polymer morphology and phase transitions. In addition to a documentation on video and photograph, respectively, the computer-controlled light intensity measurement offers the possibility of a quantitative analysis. Investigations on the phase diagram of poly(diethylsiloxane) have been carried out and show, that the transition temperature from mesophase to isotropic melt decreases with increasing pressure for pressures above 160 MPa.

Pressure effects on lipid membrane structure and dynamics

“…There have been exciting recent developments in design and use of high pressure optical microscopy systems, allowing bright field (Frey et al, 2006;Reck et al, 1998), polarizing (Reck et al, 1998;Salmon, 1975;Salmon and Ellis, 1975) and fluorescence (Nicolini et al, 2006a;Nishiyama et al, 2009;Vass et al, 2010) microscopy, at pressures as high as 700 MPa (Vass et al, 2010). A number of these cells have again been based on similar design principles to the soft matter SAXS cells described above with the pressure being held by rubber or metal o-ring type seals (Reck et al, 1998).…”

“…A number of these cells have again been based on similar design principles to the soft matter SAXS cells described above with the pressure being held by rubber or metal o-ring type seals (Reck et al, 1998). However, there has also been a very successful optical pressure cell constructed using simply narrow bore fused silica capillary tubing (Nicolini et al, 2006a) and one very recent cell designed using an internal pressurising ram (Vass et al, 2010).…”

“…Here we focus on the primary techniques that have been used in the study of lipids: X-ray diffraction (Ando et al, 2008;Brooks et al, 2010;Duesing et al, 1996;Kato and Fujisawa, 1998;Krywka et al, 2008;Mencke et al, 1993;Pressl et al, 1997;Woenckhaus et al, 2000), nuclear magnetic resonance (Bonev and Morrow, 1997b;Peng and Jonas, 1992), optical microscopy (Nicolini et al, 2006a;Reck et al, 1998;Salmon and Ellis, 1975;Vass et al, 2010) and infrared spectroscopy (Czeslik et al, 1998;Kato and Taniguchii, 1995;Schiewek et al, 2007).…”

Microscopy under pressure—An optical chamber system for fluorescence microscopic analysis of living cells under high hydrostatic pressure

“…Several researchers used Diamond-Anvil-Cells, which produce transmitted light images, but fluorescence observations are still lacking (Bassett et al, 1993;Chou et al, 1998;Couzin, 2002;Maeda and Koizumi, 1996;Sharma et al, 2002;Yayanos, 2002). The high-pressure in situ observation systems in combination with common microscopes meets the same fate (Besch and Hogan, 1996;Butz, 1987;Deguchi and Tsujii, 2002;Hogan et al, 1981;Koyama et al, 2001;Pagliaro et al, 1995;Perrier-Cornet et al, 1995;Reck et al, 1998). The first attempt to work with fluorescent dyes and high hydrostatic pressure is described by a fixation system under high pressure (Ishii et al, 2004).…”

“…Many attempts were carried out to obtain microscopic pictures under high pressure, with a sufficient quality and a high resolution (Besch and Hogan, 1996;Butz, 1987;Deguchi and Tsujii, 2002;Hogan et al, 1981;Pagliaro et al, 1995;Perrier-Cornet et al, 1995;Reck et al, 1998). In 2001, Koyama described a practicable microscopic system withstanding pressures up to 100 MPa.…”