Exploring a hidden world

Dr Jane Sibbons and her colleagues spend their working days exploring a secret world hidden from the human eye.

It's an often-beautiful world filled with images which can delight as well as inform.

And soon some of the wonders they uncover on a daily basis will be on display at Adelaide University’s Waite Campus.

As Deputy Director for Adelaide Microscopy at Adelaide University, Dr Sibbons and her team work across five separate facilities to serve internal and external researchers, government, other universities and industry across a broad spectrum of fields.

Two of their facilities are on the University’s City East Campus, one is in the Adelaide Health and Medical Sciences Building, another is at Mawson Lakes and there is the Waite facility. This enables the team to offer differing options depending on the types of research being undertaken.

Adelaide Microscopy at the Waite Campus, which has a focus on plant research, is currently collecting examples of the most beautiful images they have created, calling on external users as well as their own staff to share their favourites.

Some of those images are shown here, ahead of their debut later this year. Other images linked to this story are viewable in the Helen Mayo North building on Frome Road where Dr Sibbons works, in the lobby of Adelaide Microscopy, and in the basement.

Dr Sibbons has been with Adelaide Microscopy for nine years, drawn to it by her love of science.

“I did a lot of live cell microscopy at one stage, and that’s exciting because you can actually see how cell biology operates by interacting with the cell and seeing how it responds to the stimuli you are giving it,” she says.

“Microscopy images are valuable because of the things they can tell you which you can’t discover any other way.

“But part of why I love my job is the beauty of the images we create. We can now go to an atomic level, which I think is amazing. 

“It’s a bit like going diving – there is a whole new world just under that surface and you never know what you will find. Small can be very beautiful!”