microscope combines atomic force microscope capabilities with mass spectrometer capabilities

http://phys.org/news/2015-05-probe-chemistry-topography-mechanics-instrument.html

Any such improvement in the tools used for microscopy has to be good news for research which, hopefully, will lead to faster better and cheaper research (I say "cheaper" because it should make it take less time to obtain the same amount of useful information and, generally, time is money in research )

here is another advance in microscopy:

http://phys.org/news/2015-05-near-atomic-resolution-protein-electron-microscopy.html
"....
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"The fact that cryo-EM technology allows us to image a relatively small protein at high resolution in a near-native environment, and knowing that the structure hasn't been changed by crystallization, that's a game-changer," said Dr. Subramaniam.
In the study, using about 40,000 molecular images, the researchers were able to compute a 2.2 Å resolution map of the structure of beta-galactosidase bound to PETG. This map not only allowed the researchers to determine the positioning of PETG in the binding pocket but also enabled them to pick out individual ions and water molecules within the structure and to visualize in great detail the arrangement of the amino acids that make up the protein.
..."

This sounds like a very significant advance to me!