Protocol for the Design and Assembly of a Light Sheet Light Field Microscope

Light field microscopy is a recent development that makes it possible to obtain images of volumes with a single camera exposure, enabling studies of fast processes such as neural activity in zebrafish brains at high temporal resolution, at the expense of spatial resolution. Light sheet microscopy is also a recent method that reduces illumination intensity while increasing the signal-to-noise ratio with respect to confocal microscopes. While faster and gentler to samples than confocals for a similar resolution, light sheet microscopy is still slower than light field microscopy since it must collect volume slices sequentially. Nonetheless, the combination of the two methods, i.e., light field microscopes that have light sheet illumination, can help to improve the signal-to-noise ratio of light field microscopes and potentially improve their resolution. Building these microscopes requires much expertise, and the resources for doing so are limited. Here, we present a protocol to build a light field microscope with light sheet illumination. This protocol is also useful to build a light sheet microscope.