Optical Components of a Light Microscope

Abstract

The evolution of microscopy started from the simple magnifying glasses of the 13th century that gradually led to the first compound microscopes of the 17th century. In this chapter, the authors describe the optical components of a modern light microscope. The modern microscope includes all the components of a classical microscope, including the illuminator, the condenser lens, the objective and the ocular lens. The optical path of a fluorescence/light microscope starts with the illuminator that is the source of the light needed to visualize the samples. The modern microscope components described are far advanced than the classical microscopes and have been a fruit of the advances in optics, instrumentation and also in sensors (for cameras). Such improvements in a modern microscope have also brought with them an increased sensitivity of these components to damage.