Main Page

Welcome to Miniscope.org Wiki!

Our miniature fluorescence microscope uses wide-field fluorescence imaging to record neural activity in awake, freely moving mice. Our microscope has a mass of around 3 grams and uses only a single, flexible coaxial cable (0.3mm to 1.5mm diameter) to carry power, control signals, and imaging data. Mark Schnitzer's Lad at Standford pioneered this microscopy approach, publishing a paper in Nature Methods in 2011. The goal of this wiki site is to provide a centralized location for design files, source code, and other relevant information to help disseminate this technology to the larger neuroscience community. While our system is not an off-the-shelf commercial solution, we have focused on making it as easy as possible for a standard neuroscience lab to build and modify, requiring minimal soldering and hands on assembly. For more information please visit our Project Overview page. The Miniscope project and miniscope.org are still works in progress and will be routinely updated over the coming months and years.

Current Status of Project

The Miniscope project is now in its third year of development at UCLA and has gone through two major revisions. The work and files presented on this site are for version 3 of the Miniscope system. Using this system we have successfully imaged Hippocampal CA1, Subiculum, and Visual Cortex using 2mm diameter GRIN lenses from Grintech. While thinner GRIN lenses should theoretically be compatible with our system we have limited our initial development to larger lenses due to supply and experimental constraints.

Links to information on miniscope subsystems

Head Mounted Scope

Data Acquisition Box

Data Acquisition Software

Surgery Protocol

Master Parts List

Analysis Package

Discussion Board and FAQ

Discussion Board

FAQs

Guides and Tutorials

We designed our miniscope system to be easy to build and use. The guides below will walk you through component procurement, scope assembly, and software installation.

1. Overview of System Components
2. Part Procurement
3. System Assembly
4. Recommended Computer Specs
5. Software and Firmware Setup
6. Surgery and Implantation Guide
7. Animal Behavior Guide

Once you have built your system. This tutorial will explain how to use the different features of the scope.

Using Your Miniscope System For The First Time

Update Log

01/12/2016

Finalizing of Miniscope Master Parts List

01/10/2016

Upload of current version of all files and documents to Github

01/09/2016

Added guide to programming firmware to DAQ PCB