Standoff Biofinder: powerful search for life instrument for planetary exploration

Misra, A. K.; Acosta-Maeda, T. E.; Porter, John N.; Egan, Miles J.; Sandford, M.; Gasda, P. J.; Sharma, Shiv K.; Lucey, P. G.; Garmire, David; Zhou, Jie; Oyama, Tamra; Acosta, Noah; Wiens, R. C.; Clegg, S. M.; Ollila, A.; Abedin, Nurul

doi:10.1117/12.2324201

Cited by 4 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 14 publications

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“…Images were collected with the Baumer Camera Explorer software, which allows the CMOS camera to be synchronized with the 112 ns pulses of the Nd:YAg laser. Baumer Camera Explorer allowed for the adjustment of the camera's exposure, gain, and time delay [42]. Due to the slight angle of the CoCoBi's alignment when imaging, five shots were taken from the front of the moss tray (each corner and the center), and then the tray was rotated 180 • so the "back" of the moss could be imaged, producing ten images in total (five front and five back) every 12 h. Approximately each image captures a moss area of 5 cm by 7.6 cm.…”

Section: Lif Imaging Using the Cocobimentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Previous work [41] strove to develop a method of identifying Cu contamination in moss using image analysis of LIF response. The effort employed the "Standoff Biofinder" [42], which was a pulsed Nd:YGa dual laser system (green 532 nm laser and UV 355 nm laser) fired at a nanosecond rate. It was found that differentiation of Cu concentrations at varying µmol/cm 2 levels was possible based on the comparison of color histograms of treated moss samples to those of control samples.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Laser-Induced Fluorescence for Monitoring Environmental Contamination and Stress in the Moss Thuidium plicatile

Truax,

Dulai,

Misra

et al. 2023

Plants

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The ability to detect, measure, and locate the source of contaminants, especially heavy metals and radionuclides, is of ongoing interest. A common tool for contaminant identification and bioremediation is vegetation that can accumulate and indicate recent and historic pollution. However, large-scale sampling can be costly and labor-intensive. Hence, non-invasive in-situ techniques such as laser-induced fluorescence (LIF) are becoming useful and effective ways to observe the health of plants through the excitation of organic molecules, e.g., chlorophyll. The technique presented utilizes images collected of LIF in moss to identify different metals and environmental stressors. Analysis through image processing of LIF response was key to identifying Cu, Zn, Pb, and a mixture of the metals at nmol/cm2 levels. Specifically, the RGB values from each image were used to create density histograms of each color channel’s relative pixel abundance at each decimal code value. These histograms were then used to compare color shifts linked to the successful identification of contaminated moss samples. Photoperiod and extraneous environmental stressors had minimal impact on the histogram color shift compared to metals and presented with a response that differentiated them from metal contamination.

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Section: Lif Imaging Using the Cocobimentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Laser-Induced Fluorescence for Monitoring Environmental Contamination and Stress in the Moss Thuidium plicatile

Truax,

Dulai,

Misra

et al. 2023

Plants

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Biofinder detects biological remains in Green River fish fossils from Eocene epoch at video speed

Misra

Rowley

Zhou

et al. 2022

Sci Rep

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The “Search for life”, which may be extinct or extant on other planetary bodies is one of the major goals of NASA planetary exploration missions. Finding such evidence of biological residue in a vast planetary landscape is an enormous challenge. We have developed a highly sensitive instrument, the “Compact Color Biofinder”, which can locate minute amounts of biological material in a large area at video speed from a standoff distance. Here we demonstrate the efficacy of the Biofinder to detect fossils that still possess strong bio-fluorescence signals from a collection of samples. Fluorescence images taken by the Biofinder instrument show that all Knightia spp. fish fossils analysed from the Green River formation (Eocene, 56.0–33.9 Mya) still contain considerable amounts of biological residues. The biofluorescence images support the fact that organic matter has been well preserved in the Green River formation, and thus, not diagenetically replaced (replaced by minerals) over such a significant timescale. We further corroborated results from the Biofinder fluorescence imagery through Raman and attenuated total reflection Fourier-transform infrared (ATR-FTIR) spectroscopies, scanning electron microscopy, energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (SEM–EDS), and fluorescence lifetime imaging microscopy (FLIM). Our findings confirm once more that biological residues can survive millions of years, and that using biofluorescence imaging effectively detects these trace residues in real time. We anticipate that fluorescence imaging will be critical in future NASA missions to detect organics and the existence of life on other planetary bodies.

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Quantifying Moss Response to Metal Contaminant Exposure Using Laser-Induced Fluorescence

et al. 2022

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Tracing sources of contamination, including potentially toxic elements (PTEs), has historically been achieved through sampling and analysis of soil or biota, which are labor-intensive, costly, and destructive methods. Thus, availability of a non-destructive in situ remote sensing method for monitoring metals deposited in biota is of great interest. Laser-induced fluorescence (LIF) is an emerging spectroscopic and imaging technique that documents changes in molecular energy level in plants as a biological response to metal contamination. For a proof-of-concept study and preliminary experiment, moss was selected for experimentation due to its long history of use in tracing atmospheric deposition of PTEs. Consecutive treatments of copper chloride (CuCl2) were administered to three moss samples, simulating wet deposition every 48 h over 10 days until reaching cumulative Cu concentrations of 2.690 to 8.075 μmol/cm2. While these Cu amounts are above environmentally relevant concentrations, they allowed the best conditions for testing and fine tuning of the imaging and data processing protocols presented in this paper. Moss fluorescence was induced using both 532 nm green and 355 nm UV lasers. A CMOS camera captured images of the LIF response, and red–green–blue (RGB) decimal code values were extracted for each pixel in the images, and pixel densities of color channels from treated and untreated moss samples were compared. Results show a shift towards lower color decimal codes corresponding to increased Cu concentration. We developed and contrasted multiple quantitative analyses of color distributions and demonstrated that LIF shows great promise for remote sensing of Cu accumulation in moss at μmol/cm2 levels. Though currently, the method would be limited to highly toxic sites, it illustrates the possibility and provides a framework for development of higher-sensitivity methods to detect nmol/cm2 that are viable for urban contamination level monitoring.

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Standoff Biofinder: powerful search for life instrument for planetary exploration

Cited by 4 publications

References 14 publications

Laser-Induced Fluorescence for Monitoring Environmental Contamination and Stress in the Moss Thuidium plicatile

Laser-Induced Fluorescence for Monitoring Environmental Contamination and Stress in the Moss Thuidium plicatile

Biofinder detects biological remains in Green River fish fossils from Eocene epoch at video speed

Quantifying Moss Response to Metal Contaminant Exposure Using Laser-Induced Fluorescence

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