Event-driven acquisition for content-enriched microscopy

In fluorescence microscopy, the amount of information that can be collected from the sample is limited, often due to constraints imposed by photobleaching and phototoxicity. Here, we report an event-driven acquisition (EDA) framework, which combines real-time, neural network-based recognition of events of interest with automated control of the imaging parameters in an instant structured illumination microscope (iSIM). On-the-fly prioritization of imaging rate or experiment duration is achieved by switching between a slow imaging rate to detect the onset of biological events of interest and a fast imaging rate to enable high information content during their progression. In this way, EDA allows the data capture of mitochondrial and bacterial divisions at imaging rates that match their dynamic timescales, while extending the accessible imaging duration, and thereby increases the density of relevant information in the acquired data.