’This degree of detail is astonishing’

Inauguration of a new high-performance cryogenic electron microscope at the Center for Soft Nanoscience. The cryoelectron microscope is shielded by a casing so that nothing can be seen of the high-performance technology © WWU - Sophie Pieper When the big box with this piece of equipment was delivered in September 2022, the members of Prof. Christos Gatsogiannis' working group at Münster University's Center for Soft Nanoscience (SoN) gave a joyful welcome to the valuable consignment: "Hug the box!" they declared - a tradition among the "cryo-EM research community". No doubt about it: the new high-performance cryogenic electron microscope (cryo-EM) really is something special. Today, the equipment has already been installed and put into operation. Around 20 working groups and research alliances from the fields of Medicine, Biology and Chemistry will be using it. There are only a few of these microscopes in Germany which are in this performance category; at the University of Münster it is the first of its kind. Until just a few years ago, it was inconceivable that minute components of cells could be displayed to this degree of precision - down to individual atoms.