Skip to main content Skip to search Skip to section menu Skip to sidebar menu View accessibility support page

Imperial College LondonImperial College London

Latest News

Imperial celebrates spinout formations and community of experts

Circle of Benefactors dinner celebrates philanthropy at Imperial

Imperial and BASF step up effort to turn breakthroughs into real-world solutions

More News

Main Navigation

  • Study
    Close
    • Study overview
    • Courses
      Top Links
      • Search our courses
      • Explore subject areas
      • Chat to our students
      • Request information
      • Continuing professional development
      • Executive education
      • Adult education classes

       

    • Admissions
      Top Links
      • How to apply
      • Fees and funding
      • Accommodation
      • Student visas and immigration



    • Events, tasters and talks
    • Visit us
    • Undergraduate Open Days
    • Summer schools
    • Virtual tour
    • Help centreFind answers to frequently asked questions about studying at Imperial
    • International studentsLearn more about what Imperial has to offer students from around the world
    • Student lifeDiscover more about our entrepreneurial community, and life in London
  • Research & Innovation
    Close
    • Research and Innovation
    • Research support
      At a glance
      • Support for staff
      • Support for partners and business
      • ICT research computing support
    • About Imperial research
      At a glance
      • A-Z all research groups
      • Our research culture
      • Research Excellence Framework (REF)
    • Global Institutes
    • Centres of Excellence
    • Networks of Excellence
    • Funding opportunities
    • Impact case studiesRead case studies about Imperial research that has made a difference
    • Research newsThe latest research news from across the College
    • EnterpriseLearn how we support entrepreneurship and find research-driven solutions
  • Be Inspired
    Close
    • Be Inspired
    • Take part
      Top links
      • Schools Outreach
      • What's on at Imperial
      • Staff and student volunteering

       
       
    • Engage online
      Top links
      • Imperial news
      • Imperial Magazine
      • Imperial College Podcast
       
       
    • Societal engagement
    • The Great Exhibition Road Festival
    • Imperial Lates
    • Social media directory
    • Imperial StoriesThe very best features and opinion from the Imperial community
    • Student storiesFind out about life on campus from our team of student bloggers
    • Imperial TodaySubscribe to our daily newsletter and receive the best stories from Imperial direct to your inbox
  • About
    Close
    • About
    • Our leadership and strategy
      Overview
      • Imperial strategy
      • Academic Strategy
      • Governance structure
      • League tables
      • Global Imperial
    • Our people and values
      At a glance
      • President
      • Provost
      • Recognising our people
      • Search Imperial staff and researchers
      • Alumni stories
      • Equality diversity and inclusion
    • Our faculties and departments
    • Faculty of Engineering
    • Faculty of Medicine
    • Faculty of Natural Sciences
    • Imperial College Business School
    • Our campusesExplore our London locations
    • Our values and behavioursOur College Values both underpin and reflect our behaviour and are critical in shaping how we work
    • Sustainable ImperialWe will set a global benchmark for university sustainability
  • News
  • What's on
  • News
  • Give
  • A-Z
    • Close
    • Faculties and departments
    • Multidisciplinary networks, centres and institutes
    • Research groups
    • People finder
    • Administration and support services
  • Information for
    • Close
    • Prospective students
    • Current students
    • Alumni
    • Staff
    • Jobs at Imperial
    • Partners and business
    • Media
    • Donors
    • Parents
    • Conference organisers

Rowlands Lab

Section Navigation

  • Close
  • Rowlands Lab Overview
  • News
  • Research
    • Multiphoton microscopy
    • Super-resolution imaging
    • Neurotechnology
    • Microfluidics
    • Raman microscopy
    • SWIR
    • Algorithm development
    • Other instruments
  • Publications
  • People
  • Join the lab!
  • Code and Resources
  • Instruments and Equipment
    • Raman microscope
  • Internal
  • Home
  • Research groups
  • Rowlands Lab
  • Research

Research

Research

Temporal focusing liver

Multiphoton Microscopy

Ordinarily, infrared photons do not have enough energy to excite a fluorophore which emits at visible wavelengths. Multiphoton microscopy focuses an ultrafast pulse down to nanoscale dimensions, where the photon flux is so high that two infrared photons can be absorbed at once. The result is that fluorescence occurs only at the microscope focus, eliminating all the out-of-plane fluorescence that plagues conventional fluorescence microscopes.

Learn more about our multiphoton microscopy projects

STORM imaging

Super-resolution imaging

Normal microscopes have a fundamental limit on the smallest objects they can resolve, called the diffraction limit. For a century, it was believed that this limit was unbreakable, but in the last 20 years, several methods have emerged that allow researchers to see objects smaller than the diffraction limit.

Learn more about our super-resolution microscopy projects

Research4

3P Patch

Neurotechnology

We build instruments that interface with the brain, either to control neural activity or to recover information from it. We primarily develop new types of microscope for these applications, exploiting our expertise in optical design and automation to scale to hundreds or thousands of neurons simultaneously.

Learn more about our neurotechnology projects

Microfludics

Microfluidics

One aspect of our work is to develop microfluidic devices, primarily for drug synthesis and oncological applications. Microfludic devices are tiny chips with microchannels in (tiny channels only a few times larger than the size of a cell) and these devices have several properties which make them ideal for performing chemical syntheses.

Learn more about our microfluidic research

Research2

Raman map

Raman microscopy

Raman microscopy uses the inelastic scattering of light to infer what a sample is made of. Light that is scattered from a sample is split into its component wavelengths and analysed; the resulting 'spectra' are characteristic of the vibrational energy levels of the molecular bonds in the sample.

Learn more about our Raman projects

SWIR Flow Map

Shortwave Infrared (SWIR)

Imaging can be done using wavelengths that cannot be seen by the human eye. Infrared wavelengths are very useful for seeing deeper into scattering media, like fog or biological tissue. Working with these wavelengths requires different optical elements and detectors compared to normal imaging.

Learn more about our SWIR projects

Research3

Smoothing

Algorithm development

We develop new algorithms to process data, optimized for a number of criteria. These criteria might include efficiency, performance, automatic application, or something else. They can also be used on-line, as part of the data-gathering process, or offline, operating on already-aquired data.

Learn more about our algorithm development projects

Light sheet

Other work

Sometimes the work we do doesn't fit into the categories above. Inside you'll find a collection of research that we are either not working on any more, was a specific custom project for a collaborator, or just plain didn't work very well so we stopped work on it.

Learn more about our other work

Research

  • Multiphoton microscopy
  • Super-resolution imaging
  • Neurotechnology
  • Microfluidics
  • Raman microscopy
  • SWIR
  • Algorithm development
  • Other instruments

Contact details

Email: c.rowlands@imperial.ac.uk

Telephone: +44 (0)20 7594 1331

Department of Bioengineering
Royal School of Mines
Imperial College London
SW7 2AS

Contact & Links

Useful Links

Information for

  • Prospective students
  • Alumni
  • Jobs
  • Partners and business
  • Media
  • Donors
  • Parents
  • Conference organisers

Top links

  • Visit Imperial
  • Outlook web access
  • Contact ICT Service Desk
  • Library
  • Blackboard
  • Move Imperial

Students

  • Students main page
  • Imperial College Union
  • Student Hub
  • Careers Service
  • Imperial Mobile
  • Graduation
  • Term dates

Staff

  • Staff main page
  • ICIS
  • HR procedures
  • Pay and pensions
  • Research support
  • New staff information

Imperial partners

  • Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust
  • Imperial College Academic Health Science Centre
  • Imperial College Health Partners
  • Imperial Consultants

A-Z

  • Faculties, departments and institutes
  • Research groups
  • Administration and support services
  • People finder

College Information

Imperial College London

Address

Imperial College London
South Kensington Campus

London SW7 2AZ, UK
tel: +44 (0)20 7589 5111
Campuses & maps

Follow Imperial

Facebook X, formerly known as Twitter You Tube Linked in Instagram TikTok

Site Information

  • Sitemap
  • Accessibility
  • Modern slavery statement
  • Privacy notice
  • Use of cookies
  • Report incorrect content
  • © 2025 Imperial College London
  • Log in