An improved no-moving-parts video-rate confocal microscope

Abstract

Several years ago our research program developed a video-rate confocal microscope with no moving parts, based on synchronizing and aligning the scan of an image dissector tube (IDT) with the light returning from a microscope stage that has been acousto-optically scanned by a laser beam. Improvements on the original system have recently been completed. The laser power has been substantially increased and the laser scan is now brought into the Nikon Diaphot inverted microscope through the epi-illumination port. Aberrations in the scanned beam have been reduced by performing the beam shaping required by the acousto-optic deflectors using prisms instead of cylindrical lenses. The IDT is located at the side camera output port at the end of a simple, efficient light path. The new system is described in detail and results obtained using the microscope in reflection and fluorescence mode are presented.