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| Preface | |
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| Introduction: The history of using light as a working tool | |
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| From photons to the laser microtools | |
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| Light | |
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| Lasers: sources of peculiar light | |
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| Microscopes and cameras | |
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| Laser microbeams and optical tweezers | |
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| Why and how light can be used as a microtool | |
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| Pulsed laser microbeams | |
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| Interaction of pulsed lasers with biological matter | |
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| Interaction of optical tweezers with biological material | |
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| Light pressure: Some quantitative relationships | |
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| Gradient forces: Full control in three dimensions | |
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| Unprecedented accuracy and precision: Nanometers and piconewtons | |
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| From the first simple experiments to sophisticated applications of laser microtools | |
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| Microbeams in developmental biology | |
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| Intermezzo I: Cells and cellular organelles | |
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| Laser microbeam studies on unicellular organisms, cells and subcellular structures | |
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| Optical tweezers enter the stage | |
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| Mitosis, molecular motors and muscles: What laser microtools can teach us | |
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| Intermezzo II: Reproduction and motion | |
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| What drives cell division? Laser microtools help to find the answer | |
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| Molecular motors: True nanotechnology | |
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| DNA as a molecular individuum | |
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| The ultimate DNA analytics: Single molecules | |
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| Single molecule DNA reactions | |
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| Intermezzo III: Genes, chromosomes and genetic diseases | |
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| Laser microdissection of chromosomes | |
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| From biology to medicine | |
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| Laser microtools in plant cell biology | |
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| Microperforation of cell walls and cell membranes | |
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| From laser-induced cell fusion to antibodies and immunology | |
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| Towards medical diagnostics: From blood to cancer | |
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| Laser microbeam and optical tweezers in reproduction medicine | |
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| Appendix | |
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| Geometrical optics | |
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| Ray optics: Lenses and image formation | |
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| Resolution of a microscope and focusing a laser | |
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| Light as a wave: Mathematical representation | |
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| Absorption, scattering and fluorescence | |
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| Index | |
