Michael Wesley Davidson (November 14, 1950 – December 24, 2015) was an American

research scientist A scientist is a person who researches to advance knowledge in an area of the natural sciences. In classical antiquity, there was no real ancient analog of a modern scientist. Instead, philosophers engaged in the philosophical study of nature ...

and

microscopist Microscopy is the technical field of using microscopes to view subjects too small to be seen with the naked eye (objects that are not within the resolution range of the normal eye). There are three well-known branches of microscopy: optical, el ...

. He used microscopes to create images of crystallized substances like DNA and hormones, and he contributed to Nobel Prize-honored research about the inner workings of cells. He is credited by 2014 Nobel Laureate

Eric Betzig Robert Eric Betzig (born January 13, 1960) is an American physicist who works as a professor of physics and professor of molecular and cell biology at the University of California, Berkeley. He is also a senior fellow at the Janelia Farm Resear ...

with teaching Betzig and fellow researcher

Harald Hess Harald Frederick Hess (born September 12, 1955) is an American physicist and Senior Group Leader at Howard Hughes Medical Institute's Janelia Research Campus, known for his work in scanning probe microscopy, light microscopy and electron micros ...

about

fluorescent protein Fluorescent proteins include: * Green fluorescent protein The green fluorescent protein (GFP) is a protein that exhibits green fluorescence when exposed to light in the blue to ultraviolet range. The label ''GFP'' traditionally refers to the ...

s and providing the samples that led to the development of

photoactivated localization microscopy Photo-activated localization microscopy (PALM or FPALM) and stochastic optical reconstruction microscopy (STORM) are widefield (as opposed to point scanning techniques such as laser scanning confocal microscopy) fluorescence microscopy imaging meth ...

(PALM), a

super-resolution microscopy Super-resolution microscopy is a series of techniques in optical microscopy that allow such images to have Optical resolution, resolutions higher than those imposed by the Diffraction-limited system, diffraction limit, which is due to the diffra ...

technique. He ran the optical microscopy laboratory at

Florida State University Florida State University (FSU or Florida State) is a Public university, public research university in Tallahassee, Florida, United States. It is a senior member of the State University System of Florida and a preeminent university in the s ...

National High Magnetic Field Laboratory The National High Magnetic Field Laboratory (MagLab) is a facility at Florida State University, the University of Florida, and Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, that performs magnetic field research in physics, biology, bioengineeri ...

as a researcher. He was from

Atlanta Atlanta ( ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Georgia (U.S. state), most populous city in the U.S. state of Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia. It is the county seat, seat of Fulton County, Georg ...

and a graduate of

Georgia State University Georgia State University (Georgia State, State, or GSU) is a Public university, public research university in Atlanta, Georgia, United States. Founded in 1913, it is one of the University System of Georgia's four research universities. It is al ...

References

1950 births 2015 deaths Scientists from Florida Florida State University faculty People from Atlanta Microscopists Georgia State University alumni {{US-scientist-stub