Fluorescence microscopy has become a ubiquitous method to observe the location of specific molecular components within cells. However, the resolution of light microscopy is limited by the laws of diffraction to a few hundred nanometers, blurring most cellular details. Over the last two decades, several techniques – grouped under the ‘super-resolution microscopy’ moniker – have been designed to bypass this limitation, revealing the cellular organization down to the nanoscale. The number and variety of these techniques have steadily increased, to the point that it has become difficult for cell biologists and seasoned microscopists alike to identify the specific technique best suited to their needs. Available techniques include image processing strategies that generate super-resolved images, optical imaging schemes that overcome the diffraction limit and sample manipulations that expand the size of the biological sample. In this Cell Science at a Glance article and the accompanying poster, we provide key pointers to help users navigate through the various super-resolution methods by briefly summarizing the principles behind each technique, highlighting both critical strengths and weaknesses, as well as providing example images.

荧光显微镜已成为观察细胞内特定分子成分位置的普遍方法。但是，光学显微镜的分辨率受衍射法则的限制，只有几百纳米，从而模糊了大多数细胞的细节。在过去的二十年中，设计了几种技术（归类于“超分辨率显微镜”绰号）来绕过此限制，从而揭示了直至纳米级的细胞组织。这些技术的数量和种类一直在稳定增长，以至于对于细胞生物学家和经验丰富的显微学家而言，很难确定最适合其需求的特定技术。可用的技术包括产生超分辨率图像的图像处理策略，克服衍射极限的光学成像方案和扩大生物样品尺寸的样品处理方法。在此《细胞科学概览》文章和随附的海报中，我们通过简要概述每种技术背后的原理，强调关键的优势和劣势以及提供示例图像，提供了关键的指针，以帮助用户浏览各种超分辨率方法。 。