{"doi":"10.1371/journal.pone.0318924","title":"TWINKLE: An open-source two-photon microscope for teaching and research","abstract":"Many laboratories use two-photon microscopy through commercial suppliers, or homemade designs of considerable complexity. The integrated nature of these systems complicates customization, troubleshooting, and training on the principles of two-photon microscopy. Here, we present \"Twinkle\": a microscope for Two-photon Imaging in Neuroscience, and Kit for Learning and Education. It is a fully open, high performing and easy-to-set-up microscope that can effectively be used for both education and research. The instrument features a >1 mm field of view, using a modern objective with 3 mm working distance and 2 inch diameter optics combined with GaAsP photomultiplier tubes to maximize the fluorescence signal. We document our experiences using this system as a teaching tool in several two week long workshops, exemplify scientific use cases, and conclude with a broader note on the place of our work in the growing space of open scientific instrumentation.","journal":"PLoS ONE","year":2025,"id":562020,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":0,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9542,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2025-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":859222,"name":"Phil Rich","orcid":"0000-0001-9782-7984","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1464141,"name":"E. Mika Diamanti","orcid":"0000-0003-1199-3362","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":233151,"name":"Albert Lin","orcid":"0000-0002-4541-5889","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1161411,"name":"Sina Tafazoli","orcid":"0000-0003-1926-0227","position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":896853,"name":"Edward H. Nieh","orcid":null,"position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":394897,"name":"Stephan Y. Thiberge","orcid":"0000-0002-6583-6613","position":6,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":907971,"name":"Manuel Schottdorf","orcid":"0000-0002-5468-4255","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":93,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-19T02:56:01.883848Z","pmid":"39946384","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}