This Light-Shrinking Material Upgrades Any Microscope's Resolving Power 6 Jun 2021, 9:35 UTC · by 4 photos Usually, light microscopes are used by scientists to see live cells, but they cannot be used to visualize really small things. For example, a regular microscope can have a resolution limit of 200 nanometers (meaning that anything closer than this distance would not be seen as separate objects). The UC engineers' new high-tech microscope slide could provide a much higher resolution limit of 40 nanometers. According to Zhaowei Liu, a professor of electrical and computer engineering at UC San Diego, finding something that provides a high resolution while also being safe for live cells can be challenging. This new technology aims to do both.