11 ms·

I Heart Microscopes

90 points by hwayne 5y ago

LoveMortuus 5y ago
If any students are reading this and are a bit short on money, the thing that I tried was asking at the University the person that's responsible for maintaining the microscopes if they've got any old ones that are no longer in the system / written out. They might be old and maybe have some things broken, but it's much better then not having a microscope at all! When I tried this I got a very old german one, which still works perfectly, the only real issue with it is that it no longer has a light, but I fixed that by simply using my phone's flash and covering the flash with a piece of paper so that the light is diffused. I think this option is really good for beginners because essentially you're getting a professional grade microscope and because it might be broken here and there you won't feel that bad tinkering with it, which will in the end just result in you knowing your microscope much better! Also many things are standard, so you might be able to just get replacement parts if needed. Just an option, that you might want to check out ^^ This doesn't apply only for microscope, but for pretty much anything, many universities and companies have old gear that's no longer in use and is just sitting in storage, written out, that they'll happily give away. Including books! Especially at the university's library where they might be space constrained, they often just give old books away! At my unversity they have two tables infront of the library and on it they put books that you can take and keep. When I got my microscope, as a thanks I gave the professor an orchid and a black chocolate ^^
amelius 5y ago
I love microscopes too. The sad part is that if you zoom in further, you lose all the color.
- dylan604 5y ago
  Can you lower the intensity of the light source as you zoom in? Would that help retain any color? If the light itself isn't dimmable, you can buy small squares of ND filters that could be used.
  - Metacelsus 5y ago
    I think the comment is referring to the fact that "zooming in" below the wavelength of light (e.g. with electron microscopy) means you can't see color.
    - Wistar 5y ago
      Yes, that is what I assumed as well.
teekert 5y ago
I’m looking for a “casual” but good microscope, to show my kids these nice things. I’m a biologist and I’m used to the expensive Zeiss and Leica ones but have no idea of prices and where to start. I guess I would like to be able to see (blood) cells but also butterfly wings so something with multiple objective would be nice? Or is that too expensive? What can you get for, say 100-200 eur?
- Wistar 5y ago
  A few here. I have bought many things from Science Surplus (sciplus.com) and have always been pleased. A $150 400X monocular "student grade" microscope: https://www.sciplus.com/400x-student-grade-monocular-microscope-1900-p https://www.sciplus.com/400x-student-grade-monocular-microsc... A $334 (up to) 1000X binocular "top quality" student microscope: https://www.sciplus.com/top-quality-student-binocular-microscope-1538-p https://www.sciplus.com/top-quality-student-binocular-micros... Or, at microscope.com there are several in your price range. Here is an example, an Omano 40X-1000X Student Monocular Compound Microscope for $179: https://www.microscope.com/popular-microscopes/omano-om118-m4-microscope.html https://www.microscope.com/popular-microscopes/omano-om118-m...
  - alan-hn 5y ago
    +one billion points for ASS. I love ASS, its one of the best stores in the US. If you have a chance to visit one I would highly recommend it. Their product labels are cheeky and adorable and they have all sorts of wonderful, random shit
    - dylan604 5y ago
      Your post only makes sense if you click any of the GP's provided links. The GP's post only shows sciplus.com and Science Surplus. You have to actually view the site to see that it is American Science & Surplus for your post of "I love ASS" to make sense. In other corners of the interweb, that comment might get you different responses ;-)
      - 5y ago
aimor 5y ago
There are low-cost options too: I had fun years ago using the lens from a CD player laser as a microscope for my phone. The setup is dead simple: hold the lens with a bobby pin and attach it in front of your phone's camera with a rubber band. A portable microscope that records video! There are also small plastic scopes about the size of a D battery (would recommend one with lights). Definitely toys, but uh toys can be fun too.
- edwcross 5y ago
  A junior explorer pocket microscope (https://opentinkers.com/collections/toddlers/products/junior-explorer-pocket-microscope https://opentinkers.com/collections/toddlers/products/junior...) is about 10$ and comes without light, but the transparent plastic allows using a phone flashlight. In the end, I find it better than having its own (weaker) light source. Less prone to failure, no extra battery/weight.
dylan604 5y ago
"It’s something that completely breaks my intuition of the macroscopic world" I think the physics world is similar to quantum physics where the smaller things get, the more strange things become.
- javajosh 5y ago
  Indeed. Gravitational effects become negligible compared to mechanical/EM effects at low mass/low volume. This is why insects can crawl on the ceiling but you can't.
- dekhn 5y ago
  "Life at low Reynolds number" https://science.curie.fr/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Purcell_life_at_low_reynolds_number_1977.pdf https://science.curie.fr/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Purcell_...
rockcamus 5y ago
I love the article. Microscopes are so cool. I hope you can share more photos about anything like microelectronic stuff, more bugs or whatever. Love your post!
bacheaul 5y ago
Our main state university had an open day as part of a national "Science Week". They had a bunch of Leica stereo dissecting scopes set up on benches with random aquatic plants, bugs and other stuff in small dishes, that looked like it was something that you just pull out of your local creek. People could come in and just take a look. It was incredible. Zooming in on some of the plants, it was like there was a entire world in there that was completely invisible to the human eye. It reminded me of Feynman's quote/lecture about there being "plenty of room at the bottom". It put it into perspective about just how much room there really was.
bajsejohannes 5y ago
I once made a macro-lens [1] for a DSLR camera to serve as a microscope. You can do this by mounting a zoom lens the wrong way on the camera. It's a very fun project. Anyway, a surprising thing I learned, is the very slow movement of things that appear stationary. For instance, we would set the subject on top of a book and some papers to get it to the right height. We used a long exposure time (maybe one minute?) to get enough light. And during that time, the book and paper would decompress and rise enough to blur the image completely. The solution was just to wait five minutes for things to settle. [1] "macro", because it magnifies the subject as compared to the camera's sensor.
sitkack 5y ago
https://www.nikonsmallworld.com/galleries/photomicrography-competition https://www.nikonsmallworld.com/galleries/photomicrography-c... The 2022 submission date is April 30th.
dekhn 5y ago
I just spent most of the past few years building my own motorized microscope for automated acquisition. As of yesterday, I successfully trained a tardigrade object detector and used it to do real-time tracking of tardigrades as they move around on a slide, for hours (yes, there is actually a hypothesis).
Wistar 5y ago
Also, this article discusses/ranks a few reasonably microscopes: https://www.digitalcameraworld.com/buying-guides/best-microscopes https://www.digitalcameraworld.com/buying-guides/best-micros...

90 points by hwayne 5y ago

If any students are reading this and are a bit short on money, the thing that I tried was asking at the University the person that's responsible for maintaining the microscopes if they've got any old ones that are no longer in the system / written out. They might be old and maybe have some things broken, but it's much better then not having a microscope at all! When I tried this I got a very old german one, which still works perfectly, the only real issue with it is that it no longer has a light, but I fixed that by simply using my phone's flash and covering the flash with a piece of paper so that the light is diffused. I think this option is really good for beginners because essentially you're getting a professional grade microscope and because it might be broken here and there you won't feel that bad tinkering with it, which will in the end just result in you knowing your microscope much better! Also many things are standard, so you might be able to just get replacement parts if needed. Just an option, that you might want to check out ^^ This doesn't apply only for microscope, but for pretty much anything, many universities and companies have old gear that's no longer in use and is just sitting in storage, written out, that they'll happily give away. Including books! Especially at the university's library where they might be space constrained, they often just give old books away! At my unversity they have two tables infront of the library and on it they put books that you can take and keep. When I got my microscope, as a thanks I gave the professor an orchid and a black chocolate ^^

amelius 5y ago

I love microscopes too. The sad part is that if you zoom in further, you lose all the color.

dylan604 5y ago
Can you lower the intensity of the light source as you zoom in? Would that help retain any color? If the light itself isn't dimmable, you can buy small squares of ND filters that could be used.
- Metacelsus 5y ago
  I think the comment is referring to the fact that "zooming in" below the wavelength of light (e.g. with electron microscopy) means you can't see color.
  - Wistar 5y ago
    Yes, that is what I assumed as well.

teekert 5y ago

I’m looking for a “casual” but good microscope, to show my kids these nice things. I’m a biologist and I’m used to the expensive Zeiss and Leica ones but have no idea of prices and where to start. I guess I would like to be able to see (blood) cells but also butterfly wings so something with multiple objective would be nice? Or is that too expensive? What can you get for, say 100-200 eur?

Wistar 5y ago
A few here. I have bought many things from Science Surplus (sciplus.com) and have always been pleased. A $150 400X monocular "student grade" microscope: https://www.sciplus.com/400x-student-grade-monocular-microscope-1900-p https://www.sciplus.com/400x-student-grade-monocular-microsc... A $334 (up to) 1000X binocular "top quality" student microscope: https://www.sciplus.com/top-quality-student-binocular-microscope-1538-p https://www.sciplus.com/top-quality-student-binocular-micros... Or, at microscope.com there are several in your price range. Here is an example, an Omano 40X-1000X Student Monocular Compound Microscope for $179: https://www.microscope.com/popular-microscopes/omano-om118-m4-microscope.html https://www.microscope.com/popular-microscopes/omano-om118-m...
- alan-hn 5y ago
  +one billion points for ASS. I love ASS, its one of the best stores in the US. If you have a chance to visit one I would highly recommend it. Their product labels are cheeky and adorable and they have all sorts of wonderful, random shit
  - dylan604 5y ago
    Your post only makes sense if you click any of the GP's provided links. The GP's post only shows sciplus.com and Science Surplus. You have to actually view the site to see that it is American Science & Surplus for your post of "I love ASS" to make sense. In other corners of the interweb, that comment might get you different responses ;-)
    - 5y ago

aimor 5y ago

There are low-cost options too: I had fun years ago using the lens from a CD player laser as a microscope for my phone. The setup is dead simple: hold the lens with a bobby pin and attach it in front of your phone's camera with a rubber band. A portable microscope that records video! There are also small plastic scopes about the size of a D battery (would recommend one with lights). Definitely toys, but uh toys can be fun too.

edwcross 5y ago
A junior explorer pocket microscope (https://opentinkers.com/collections/toddlers/products/junior-explorer-pocket-microscope https://opentinkers.com/collections/toddlers/products/junior...) is about 10$ and comes without light, but the transparent plastic allows using a phone flashlight. In the end, I find it better than having its own (weaker) light source. Less prone to failure, no extra battery/weight.

dylan604 5y ago

"It’s something that completely breaks my intuition of the macroscopic world" I think the physics world is similar to quantum physics where the smaller things get, the more strange things become.

javajosh 5y ago
Indeed. Gravitational effects become negligible compared to mechanical/EM effects at low mass/low volume. This is why insects can crawl on the ceiling but you can't.
dekhn 5y ago
"Life at low Reynolds number" https://science.curie.fr/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Purcell_life_at_low_reynolds_number_1977.pdf https://science.curie.fr/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Purcell_...

rockcamus 5y ago

I love the article. Microscopes are so cool. I hope you can share more photos about anything like microelectronic stuff, more bugs or whatever. Love your post!

bacheaul 5y ago

Our main state university had an open day as part of a national "Science Week". They had a bunch of Leica stereo dissecting scopes set up on benches with random aquatic plants, bugs and other stuff in small dishes, that looked like it was something that you just pull out of your local creek. People could come in and just take a look. It was incredible. Zooming in on some of the plants, it was like there was a entire world in there that was completely invisible to the human eye. It reminded me of Feynman's quote/lecture about there being "plenty of room at the bottom". It put it into perspective about just how much room there really was.

bajsejohannes 5y ago

I once made a macro-lens [1] for a DSLR camera to serve as a microscope. You can do this by mounting a zoom lens the wrong way on the camera. It's a very fun project. Anyway, a surprising thing I learned, is the very slow movement of things that appear stationary. For instance, we would set the subject on top of a book and some papers to get it to the right height. We used a long exposure time (maybe one minute?) to get enough light. And during that time, the book and paper would decompress and rise enough to blur the image completely. The solution was just to wait five minutes for things to settle. [1] "macro", because it magnifies the subject as compared to the camera's sensor.

sitkack 5y ago

https://www.nikonsmallworld.com/galleries/photomicrography-competition https://www.nikonsmallworld.com/galleries/photomicrography-c... The 2022 submission date is April 30th.

dekhn 5y ago

I just spent most of the past few years building my own motorized microscope for automated acquisition. As of yesterday, I successfully trained a tardigrade object detector and used it to do real-time tracking of tardigrades as they move around on a slide, for hours (yes, there is actually a hypothesis).

Wistar 5y ago

Also, this article discusses/ranks a few reasonably microscopes: https://www.digitalcameraworld.com/buying-guides/best-microscopes https://www.digitalcameraworld.com/buying-guides/best-micros...