A team of five undergraduates from the USC Viterbi School of Engineering have built a specialized microscope as part of the course ENGR 499 Microscope Design and Construction. Called an optical projection tomography (OPT) microscope, the instrument produces three-dimensional images of pea-sized biological samples, such as organs and embryos. This provides a valuable tool that enables USC’s stem cell scientists to study how organs develop, maintain and repair themselves.