TOUCHED BY LYME: Microscope you helped buy is now on the job

Last May, we asked your help in raising money to purchase a cutting-edge, high-powered microscope for Lyme researcher Dr. Eva Sapi. The atomic force microscope she needed to continue her important work with Lyme biofilms was going to cost in the neighborhood of $110,000. We’d raised most of that through private donations, but still needed about $20,000 more to seal the deal.

We launched a crowd-funding website through Indie-go-go, and because of people like you, we raised the final $20,000 in three days! Much of that was made up of modestly-sized donations, $5, $10, $25, demonstrating once again how small steps can add up to big actions when we all work together.

And you didn’t stop at the $20,000 mark either. In fact, the Indie-go-go website brought in about $35,000 in total. Along with other donations, we raised $150,000 for the microscope project. Extra funds will support Dr. Sapi’s first research project with the microscope, which will investigate Lyme biofilms.

At the recent San Diego Lymewalk, LymeDisease.org’s Lorraine Johnson presented Dr. Sapi with a symbolic check for the amount raised. And this week, the microscope was delivered to Dr. Sapi’s lab at the University of New Haven. She and her fellow researchers lost no time in putting it to work.

All I can say is: biofilms, watch out! Your days are numbered.

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TOUCHED BY LYME is written by Dorothy Kupcha Leland, LymeDisease.org’s VP for Education and Outreach. Contact her at dleland@lymedisease.org.