Title:
See small, Think big: Visualizing small things leads to big discoveries.

Abstract:
Seeing is believing. Watching shapes and movements of individual molecules is the best way for understanding molecular mechanisms underlying molecular processes. However, these molecules are often too small to directly observe their structural dynamics at native state. Hence, researchers have separately analyzed the molecular structures and dynamics, and created molecular process models that could explain individual experimental results. This strategy has achieved brilliant successes, but not clarified all of the molecular processes due to limitations in each experiment. The high speed scanning probe microscopy (HS-SPM) and the super resolution frequency modulation atomic force microscopy (FM-AFM) developed in Kanazawa University broke this barrier and has revealed various molecular processes in physical, chemical and biological phenomena. In this colloquium, I will introduce the principles of SPM techniques especially that of HS-SPM and FM-AFM, with their advantages and
limitations, showing representative results along with other research activities and programs that are available at Nano Life-Science Institute (Nano LSI).