The 2014 Nobel Prize in Chemistry has been awarded to three researchers, one at the Max Planck Institute of Biophysical Chemistry in Gottingen, one at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute in Virginia, and the third at Stanford.
http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/c...press.html
Apparently the three of them, each working independently, discovered two different (but seemingly closely related) ways for optical microscopes to resolve objects smaller than 1/2 the wavelength of visible light. Both of the methods seem to my layman's eye to involve stimulating desired molecules with lasers so that they glow, then capturing that light.
http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/c...press.html
Apparently the three of them, each working independently, discovered two different (but seemingly closely related) ways for optical microscopes to resolve objects smaller than 1/2 the wavelength of visible light. Both of the methods seem to my layman's eye to involve stimulating desired molecules with lasers so that they glow, then capturing that light.