Emmanuel Beaurepaire (DR1 CNRS, LOB/École Polytechnique) is a pioneer of multiphoton and harmonic generation deep-tissue microscopy. Research: (1) two-photon excited fluorescence (2PEF) and three-photon deep-tissue brain imaging; (2) second-harmonic generation (SHG) and third-harmonic generation (THG) label-free imaging of collagen, myosin, myelin; (3) multimodal 3-photon light-sheet microscopy with ultrafast lasers; (4) metabolic imaging using FLIM/NADH. Key LOB permanent staff (May 2024). Active collaboration with LCF/Lasers group on ultrafast laser development.

Dunsby co-invented oblique plane microscopy (a single-objective light-sheet technique) and develops multidimensional fluorescence lifetime and light-sheet imaging instrumentation for live-cell and tissue imaging, applied to cancer diagnostics and cell biology.

Goldys was Deputy Director of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Nanoscale BioPhotonics and now leads a nanoscale biophotonics group in Biomedical Engineering. The programme is about extracting diagnostic information from very weak optical signals inside cells and tissue: luminescent and upconverting nanoparticle probes with long lifetimes that allow time-gated, background-free detection; hyperspectral unmixing of native cellular autofluorescence (NADH, FAD, porphyrins) as a completely label-free readout of cell state, which she has pushed toward clinical use in reproductive medicine and cancer; and nanoparticle-mediated therapy. Positioned against the established body of NV-ensemble quantum sensing work — DEER, nanoscale NMR and T1 relaxometry protocols operating at pT/sqrt(Hz) field sensitivity — time-gated luminescence and NV relaxometry are two solutions to the same problem — how to read a faint, specific signal out of an autofluorescent, optically hostile biological background — and her clinical translation experience is exactly the missing capability in most quantum-biosensing groups. Preferred attribute present: advanced/label-based imaging with a genuine human-application pathway.

Hinde is a fluorescence-fluctuation physicist embedded in cell biology: she uses pair-correlation function analysis, number-and-brightness, phasor-FLIM and FRET to read out chromatin compaction, protein-chromatin binding dynamics and nucleocytoplasmic transport in living nuclei, at spatial and temporal scales that conventional imaging averages away. The programme is a technique-pushing one — the emphasis is on extracting nanoscale structural information from photon statistics rather than on brute-force localisation — and it is now being coupled to quantum sensing through her QUBIC investigatorship, where the goal is to combine fluorescence readouts with NV-based magnetic and spin-noise contrast in the same cell. Positioned against the established body of NV-ensemble quantum sensing work — DEER, nanoscale NMR and T1 relaxometry protocols operating at pT/sqrt(Hz) field sensitivity — her role in QUBIC is to supply the cell-biological questions and the correlative optical readouts that make pT/sqrt(Hz)-class ensemble sensing biologically interpretable. Preferred attribute present: lifetime- and orientation-resolved methods pushing past the usual resolution limits.

Kuimova pioneered the use of fluorescent 'molecular rotor' probes combined with fluorescence lifetime imaging (FLIM) to quantitatively map intracellular microviscosity in live cells and tissue, with applications spanning photodynamic therapy, membrane biophysics and G-quadruplex DNA imaging.

McGinty develops fluorescence lifetime imaging (FLIM) instrumentation, including endoscopic and widefield FLIM systems, for applications in cancer diagnosis and metabolic/functional imaging.

Needleman combines polarized-light microscopy, second-harmonic generation, single-molecule tracking, and fluorescence-lifetime (FLIM) metabolic imaging to study self-organization of the mitotic spindle and, in a clinically translated direction, non-invasive metabolic imaging of human oocytes and embryos for IVF viability assessment — an orientation- and lifetime-resolved imaging program with an active human-trial/clinical translation component.

Smith runs Melbourne's time-resolved fluorescence facility and specialises in the information channels most people throw away: fluorescence lifetime, anisotropy decay and its orientational content, and single-molecule photophysics, applied to organic semiconductors, energy-transfer systems and biological samples. The group builds its own confocal microspectroscopy instrumentation for time-resolved anisotropy imaging and single-molecule detection. Positioned against the established body of NV-ensemble quantum sensing work — DEER, nanoscale NMR and T1 relaxometry protocols operating at pT/sqrt(Hz) field sensitivity — lifetime- and orientation-resolved fluorescence is the principal orthogonal contrast mechanism to spin-based sensing, and his instrumentation is the natural correlative partner for NV-ensemble DEER/relaxometry experiments at pT/sqrt(Hz) that need an independent optical readout of the same specimen. Preferred attribute present: orientation- and lifetime-resolved methods.

Chiara Stringari (CRCN CNRS, LOB) develops FLIM-based metabolic imaging. Research: (1) fluorescence lifetime imaging microscopy (FLIM) of NAD(P)H and FAD in live tissue for label-free metabolic mapping; (2) phasor analysis of FLIM data for cellular metabolism states; (3) imaging of myelin dynamics using label-free nonlinear microscopy; (4) metabolic imaging in development and disease. 2025 paper on myelin in Optica.