Stained Glass Petri Dish

Description

2019 Honorable Mention, Northwestern Scientific Images Contest. When growing cells outside the body, it is important to give them a safe place to attach and lay down roots. Like how plants need fertile soil, cells need nutrients to survive for long periods of time in a petri dish. One way to address this problem is to coat the surface of the dish with a biomaterial before laying the cells down. Researchers took this image to study the stability of the coating after 60 days. They made a scratch mark on the surface to measure the thickness of the coating. The instrument then colors the image by height. The red areas are peaks, and the blue areas are valleys. The height variation in this image is due to salts that were present as the coating dried. This caused the final image to appear like stained glass.

Abstract

This image originally appeared as part of Northwestern's Scientific Images Contest. The contest and subsequent exhibitions are organized by Science in Society, the university's research center for science education and public engagement. Further information and opportunities to participate are available on their website.

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