Practical

The oil immersion method enhances the resolving power of a microscope, enabling light microscopy to distinguish finer details. Immersion oil—clear and colorless, having a refractive index of about 1.515—is placed in between the lens and the specimen. The refractive index is higher; therefore, less light is refracted. If less light is refracted, then less is … Read more

Now, let’s cover the TEM. The best way to get to know the TEM is to understand where and why you’d use one. When would you ever need to see something so small that light can never penetrate it? It’s like staring at an ant—but in space. This is not a microparticle microscope you’d find … Read more

A scanning electron microscope (SEM) produces high-resolution images from an electron beam that scans a focused beam over the surface of a specimen. The benefit of using electrons as opposed to an optical light microscope is that, due to electronegativity, the resultant interactions with the orbitals surrounding the atom create signals that indicate surface morphology … Read more

What is phase contrast microscopy? Okay, so picture this: back in the 1930s, scientists were struggling to study things like living cells or bacteria under a microscope. Why? Because those tiny critters are practically see-through! You couldn’t get a clear look without dunking them in harsh dyes—which, you know, kinda killed them. Not exactly helpful if you … Read more

Confocal microscopy offers some pretty cool perks compared to regular optical microscopes. For starters, it gives you a razor-thin focus depth, cuts out that annoying blurry background glow, and lets you snap crisp, detailed “slices” of thick samples—one after another. This makes it a go-to tool in biomedicine, especially for studying cells and tissues, whether … Read more

What is a Dissecting microscope or a Stereo microscope? A dissecting microscope—also known as a stereo microscope—is an optical microscope study apparatus that enables the observation of an object at low to moderate magnification (typically 5x to 250x) through reflective light versus transmitted light. Thus, it’s a microscope made for viewing little details that could … Read more

Designed to enlarge things too tiny for the human eye to see, a microscope is a tool. It provides a portal to the hidden world of minute structures, allowing medical practitioners, teachers, and researchers to examine materials, cells, and creatures in until unheard-of clarity. Microscopes range significantly in kind, from simple to very sophisticated models. … Read more