In Case You Missed It: Recapping the Emerging Leader in Molecular Spectroscopy Award Session

At the 2025 SciX Conference, Lingyan Shi, an associate professor in the Department of Bioengineering at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), chaired a technical session that recognized her as the recipient of the Emerging Leader of Molecular Spectroscopy Award, presented by Spectroscopy magazine. Shi invited five speakers to give talks during this session: Wei Min of Columbia University, Rohit Bhargava of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Katsumasa Fujita of the University of Osaka, Eric Potma of the University of California, Irvine, and Ji-Xin Cheng of Boston University (1).

Min’s talk, titled “Super-multiplex Optical Imaging Without Labeling,” discussed a breakthrough in optical imaging by introducing a label-free, super-multiplex technique that achieves true molecular specificity without the limitations of traditional labeling methods (1). Bhargava’s talk was titled, “Infrared Spectroscopic Imaging: Developing a Chemistry Workhorse into Technology for Cancer Pathology.” His talk covered advanced IR spectroscopic imaging technologies that bridge molecular-level chemical analysis with cancer diagnostics, achieving micron- to nanoscale resolution using quantum cascade lasers and AI-driven workflows and how these innovations enable real-time, high-fidelity imaging for clinical pathology and promise unprecedented precision in cancer diagnosis (1).

In the second half of the award session, Fujita discussed how advances in Raman microscopy, through faster imaging, enhanced molecular sensitivity, and tailored probes, are transforming label-free molecular imaging into a powerful tool for real-time metabolic tracking and comprehensive molecular phenotyping in biological and medical research (1). Potma addressed how thermal expansion effects in photo-induced force microscopy (PiFM) can distort measurements and presented methods to separate these thermal artifacts from true electromagnetic forces for more accurate signal interpretation (1). And finally, Cheng concluded the session by talking about a high-energy CARS microscopy approach that uses chirped femtosecond pulses and self-supervised denoising to achieve a 300-fold signal enhancement and improved signal-to-background ratio, enabling highly sensitive bond-selective biomedical imaging (1).

In our continued recap the SciX Conference, Spectroscopy sat down with Shi, who was this year’s winner of the Emerging Leader in Molecular Spectroscopy Award, to reflect on the SciX Conference. In our first part of our three-part interview with Shi, she recapped her talk that she delivered at the award plenary (2). In the second part of a three-part interview, Shi recaps the award technical session that she chaired at the SciX Conference, highlighting the speakers she invited and what they discussed.

This interview clip is the second part of our interview with Shi. To stay up to date with the latest coverage of the 2025 SciX Conference, click here.

References

1. SciX Conference, Final Program. SciX Conference. Available at: https://www.scixconference.org/2025-final-program (accessed 2025-10-20).
2. Wetzel, W. Recapping the SciX Award Plenary. Spectroscopy. Available at: https://www.spectroscopyonline.com/view/recapping-the-scix-award-plenary (accessed 2025-10-20).