Principal Investigator
Virginijus Barzda
Prof. Barzda is a Professor at the Departments of Physics, and Chemical and Physical Sciences, University of Toronto. His research includes the development of novel imaging modalities for nonlinear optical microscopy. He developed a wide range of microscopy techniques that employ second-harmonic generation (SHG), third-harmonic generation (THG) and multiphoton excitation fluorescence image contrast for non-invasive label-free imaging of biological structures, live cells, and subcellular organelles. He focuses on the ultrastructural characterization of biological tissues with nonlinear polarimetric microscopy methods. The ultrastructural imaging is applied to study the organization of collagen in cancer tissue and to investigate contractility mechanisms in cardiac and skeletal muscles. In addition, he develops novel labels for nonlinear microscopy and studies photosynthetic structures.
Group Members
Serguei Kroulglov
Research Associate
Serguei obtained his Ph.D. from the Institute of Physics Academy of Sciences of Belarus (Minsk), where he worked as a Research Associate for ten years. He was a visiting Professor for Quantum Field Theory at Nankai University (China) and Professor at Belarus University (Minsk) before moving to Toronto as a researcher and teacher at International Educational Centre Toronto. He joined the University of Toronto as a sessional lecturer and since 2014 he has been a Research Associate working with Prof. Barzda.
Ahmad Golaraei
Post-doctoral Fellow
Ahmad obtained his BSc and MSc in Physics from Amirkabir University of Technology (Tehran Polytechnic) in Iran. He joined Barzda lab in 2012 as a Ph.D. student. The focus of his Ph.D. work was studying the structural properties of collagen in biological tissues using polarization-resolved second-harmonic generation microscopy. He used collagen structural properties to differentiate between normal and cancerous human tissues. He is currently a postdoctoral fellow in our lab as well as in Prof. Brian Wilson's group at Princess Margaret Cancer Research Centre where he is developing a stimulated Raman scattering (SRS) microscope.
Kamdin Mirsanaye
Ph.D. Candidate
Kamdin obtained his Honours BSc in Mathematical Physics at Simon Fraser University, in British Columbia (2016). He joined Barzda lab as an MSc student and studied the ultrastructural properties of collagen in the conductive system of the heart using polarimetric second-harmonic generation microscopy (2017). As a Ph.D. candidate, Kamdin is developing a Spectral-resolved polarimetric nonlinear microscopy technique to investigate fundamental properties of nonlinear light-matter interactions. He is also involved with the construction of a wide-field microscope for fast, and high-resolution imaging.
Leonardo Uribe
Ph.D. Candidate
Abiramy Karunendiran
Ph.D. Candidate
Abi obtained her BSc at the University of Toronto Mississauga with a double major in biology and physics and she continues to work at the interface of these two disciplines co-supervised by Dr. Bryan Stewart. She completed her MSc studies on the use of third harmonic generation microscopy to monitor the development of the Drosophila compound eye. She now continues her Ph.D. work studying the structure and development of muscle using polarization-based second-harmonic generation microscopy.
Fayez Habach
NSERC summer student
Previous GROUP Members
Postdoctoral Fellows:
2015-2018 Masood Samim
2015-2017 Haitao Zhao- Currently an optics scientist at Wise Device Inc. (WDI)
2012-2017 Richard Cisek- Currently a research associate at the Department of Chemistry at Saint Mary's University
2014-2014 Danielle Tokarz- Currently an Assistant Professor at the Department of Chemistry at Saint Mary's University
2013-2014 Daaf Sandkuijl- Currently a senior optical scientist at Fluidigm Corporation
2004-2006 Arkady Major- Currently a Professor at the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at University of Manitoba
2003/03-10 Donatas Zigmantas- Currently an associate professor at the Department of Chemistry at Lund University
Doctoral students:
2012-2018 Ahmad Golaraei, “Polarimetric Second Harmonic Generation Microscopy for Histopathology”- Currently a postdoctoral fellow and Princess Margaret Cancer Research Centre
2012-2017 Lukas Kontenis, “Experimental Nonlinear Polarimetric Microscopy”- Currently an R&D engineer at Light Conversion (Lithuania)
2009-2015 Masood Samim, “Nonlinear Polarimetric Microscopy for Biomedical Imaging”
2009-2014 Danielle Tokarz, “Nonlinear Optical Properties of Carotenoid and Chlorophyll Harmonophores”- Currently an Assistant Professor at Department of Chemistry at Saint Mary's University
2008-2013 Adam Tuer, “Nonlinear microscopy for histology”
2007-2013 Daaf Sandkuijl, “New harmonic generation microscopy techniques based on focal volume modeling”- Currently a senior optical scientist at Fluidigm Corporation
2005-2014 Nicole Prent, “Characterization of muscle contraction with second harmonic generation microscopy”- Currently a college professor at Okanagan College
2003-2012 Richard Cisek, “Structural investigation of biological and semiconductor nanostructures with nonlinear multicontrast microscopy”- Currently a research associate at Department of Chemistry at Saint Mary's University
2003-2008 Catherine Greenhalgh, “Nonlinear multicontrast microscopy for structural and dynamic investigations of myocytes”- Currently a senior optical systems designer at Raytheon ELCAN Optical Technologies
Master’s students:
2016-2017 Kamdin Mirsanaye, “Characterization of Human Cardiac Tissue Structure with Polarization-Dependent Second-Harmonic Generation Microscopy”
2014-2015 Abiramy Karunendiran, “Development of fruit fly eye studied with nonlinear optical microscopy”
2014-2015 Ian Tretyakov, “Spectrally-resolved time-correlated single-photon-counting microscopy”
2013-2014 Maria Correa, “Analysis of peroxisomes movement: Active and passive transport through the actin filament”
2011-2012 Lukas Kontenis, "Design and evaluation of a second-harmonic microscope with forward and sideways detection channels"
2008-2009 Danielle Tokarz, “Development of harmonophores for nonlinear microscopy”
2006-2007 Shuo Li, “Fluid inclusion analysis in quartz using second and third harmonic generation microscopy”
2006-2007 Gurinderpal Grang, “Investigation of peroxisomes with nonlinear microscopy”
2004-2005 Nicole Prent, “Imaging biological structures and visualizing changing transmembrane potential gradients with harmonic generation and multiphoton excitation fluorescence microscopy”
Undergraduate students:
Faiyza Alam
Vaishnavi Raja
Yeji Ro
Ahmed Ellithy
Wayne Bonnet
Sang Park
Russ Algar
Oscar Cisek
Michal Hodal
Maike-Svenja Milkereit
James Mccrae
Gerardo Quiroz
Gautham Radhakrishnan
Chantal Greenhalgh
Anshudeep Mathur
Andy Chow
Alexey Borshch